Lucy Knight's Hillcrest home was just starting to dry out after Cyclone Debbie flooded the bottom level last week - then the tail end of Cyclone Cook hit Auckland.
Knight, who made headlines in 2014 when she suffered a brain injury after intervening in a bag-snatching, said she had ten dehumidifiers running downstairs this afternoon when she realised water levels were rising again.
A courtyard area down some steps outside the bottom of her family's home was flooding, thanks to a suspected blocked drain.
Knight outside her home in Hillcrest. Photo / Dean Purcell
"I saw the water rising and I thought 'oh no this is not good'," Knight said.
She quickly unplugged the dehumidifiers and dragged them away from the wall, as the rainwater made its way across the room for a second time in as many weeks.
She's now used up all the family's towels trying to plug the leaks.
When the house flooded during Cyclone Debbie, it encroached halfway across the floor and destroyed the carpet, which had to be ripped up after becoming totally waterlogged.
One blessing was new carpet had not yet been laid.
She thought there must be a blocked drain on the property, because despite clearing back wet leaves and debris after Debbie, the courtyard had flooded again.
"Last week we were woken up by our 16 year old who sleeps downstairs," Knight said.
He came to tell her and her husband at midnight that his room was flooding, and the trio were up until 1.30am trying to find a drain to see if it could be cleared.
"We went outside there was an area downstairs which has a retaining wall which flooded about a foot."
The family's insurance company told them not only would the carpet have to go, but the skirting boards and gib as well.
"It was much full on than we were expecting."
Flooding on the bottom floor of Lucy Knight's North Shore home. Photo / Twitter
When the flooding started again today, Knight called her husband who was out trying to buy a water pump this afternoon.
