KEY POINTS:
Mail deliveries in the Washdyke area of South Canterbury are unlikely today after 18 workers had to be evacuated from the postal centre this morning.
Police and emergency services were called to the centre in Washdyke, 5km northwest of Timaru, just after 7.10am, when a postie came in contact with an unidentified white powder substance.
New Zealand Post spokeswoman Fiona Mayo said the centre manager began emergency procedures and 18 staff were evacuated from the building.
"Five staff unfortunately are having to be decontaminated," Ms Mayo told NZPA.
"They were in close enough contact to the postie for emergency services to consider they needed to undertake the decontamination procedure, which isn't very pleasant, unfortunately."
The procedure involved people being thoroughly doused in water.
Ms Mayo said the five staff would then be taken to hospital for monitoring.
"Today's mail probably won't be delivered. Obviously there are delays."
She said the incident was a "timely reminder" for people to think seriously about what they sent in the mail.
"It's a very unpleasant experience for our postal workers, it holds up the mail and causes all sorts of disruption," Ms Mayo said.
Today's incident was the first of its kind for "about two months".
Scientists from Environmental Science and Research would take a sample for testing "but 99.9 per cent of the time it's benign", Ms Mayo said.
She said people could check the NZ Post website for advice on goods prohibited from being sent in the mail and how to package mail properly.
- NZPA
