Wellington: Rain has caused havoc in New Zealand’s largest city, Auckland. News agency AP has quoted the police as saying that two people died and two others were missing due to record rainfall in New Zealand’s largest city on Saturday. Authorities declared a state of emergency for the Auckland region and the country’s new Prime Minister Chris Hipkins visited the city in a military aircraft to assess the damage. Let us tell you that after the resignation of Jacinda Ardern, Hipkins has taken the oath of the top post on Wednesday.
Hipkins said that the rains affected the city rapidly. He has advised Aucklanders to be ready to deal with any situation in view of the possibility of more rain. Earlier, hundreds of people were stranded at Auckland Airport overnight after all flights were suspended at the airport and parts of the terminal were flooded.
Although Air New Zealand said it resumed domestic flights in and out of Auckland on Saturday afternoon, it was not yet sure when international flights would resume. According to weather agencies, February 27 was the wettest day ever recorded in Auckland. On Friday evening, some places received more than 15 centimeters (6 inches) of rain in just three hours.
At the same time, the police said that they found the body of one person in a flooded culvert on Friday evening and the body of another person in a flooded park in the early hours of Saturday. Police said a third person was reported missing after being swept away by floodwaters, while a fourth person remained untraceable after a landslide collapsed a house in the suburb of Remuera. The heavy rain can be gauged from a video, in which people are seen being filled with water till their chest.
