Cyclone Gabrielle: Our extraordinary stories of resilience after a disaster

Saturday, 18 February 2023

Whirinaki resident Hayley Greig has spent days cleaning up her swamped home, and is incredibly grateful for the help she and her family have received from volunteers.

As the Barber family huddled in their roof cavity, furniture bobbing against the ceiling in floodwaters below, they heard a motor approach.

The sound was a godsend for Chris who six hours previously had been told by a 111 operator to smash a hole in the ceiling and shelter with his wife and two young children.

Frantically banging on the roof, the family yelled out their whereabouts, and when the inflatable boat arrived Chris asked its wetsuit-clad occupants “are you guys the Navy?”

“Nah, we’re just three Māori boys” came the reply.

* Our village in crisis: How Muriwai came together after its worst week

* Cyclone Gabrielle: Fears mount for the missing as rescue attempts continue

Chris Barber hugs his brother Philip after the pair were reunited on the thick silt and mud that destroyed Chris' home when floodwaters swept through Esk Valley near Napier.

* Police take hard line on 'abhorrent' offending in Cyclone Gabrielle aftermath

The men who saved the Esk Valley family from the ravages of Cyclone Gabrielle are anonymous heroes for now but their actions reflect scenes played out across New Zealand’s northern regions.

St John volunteer first responder and EMT student Samantha Seon.

Described by Prime Minister Chris Hipkins as the worst storm this century, the cyclone has resulted in unprecedented carnage. About 10,000 people are displaced from their homes, regions remain cut-off from communications and the death-toll stands at nine, with more expected. Grave concerns are held for the thousands who can’t be contacted.

While many questions will be eventually asked about the official disaster response, much of the burden has been shouldered by thousands of everyday NZers stepping up to help their fellow Kiwis.

And, as exemplified by the tragic deaths of volunteer firefighters Craig Stevens and Dave van Zwanenberg, many risked their own lives to do so.

Volunteer firefighters extinguished a vegetation fire at Waikaia on Thursday night.

Just one of those was Samantha Seon who was winding down at her Mangawhai home when her pager sounded at 8pm on Monday night.

An elderly woman had fallen and needed to be assessed, says the volunteer St John first responder and EMT intern; a run-of-the-mill type of call-out.

Hoping the patient could remain at home to avoid venturing out in the cyclone, Seon discovered she needed to be taken to Whangarei Hospital, and the normally simple trip quickly became perilous.

Navigating through gale force winds and flying debris, the ambulance was trapped multiple times by downed trees. When the fire service couldn’t move them, Seon took the longest possible route to hospital, finally getting home at 4.30am.

The graphic designer downplays the experience but does say it reflects the importance of volunteers, especially in smaller communities.

“Mangawhai fire service [staff] all have other jobs. In the first 24 hours I counted 15 sirens; the teams were out all day and night. They're always ready to go.“

Speaking from a Hawke’s Bay fire station, Tony Adie apologises for crying as he describes the scenes his colleagues face.

Tongan RSE workers stranded on a rooftop in Napier during Cyclone Gabrielle.

“It's a like a war zone, Cyclone Bola was nothing compared to this…I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Adie and his workmates cover both Napier and Hastings with a mix of volunteer and professional staff currently grieving the deaths of the two Muriwai firefighters and facing the loss of their own properties and possessions.

As for what Adie’s seen this week? Too much to make sense of.

SAR squad members in Dargaville. Ben McKernan, Search and Rescue Coordinator for Ruakākā Surf Lifesaving Patrol, is second from right.

There were the 120 RSE workers evacuated from orchards, and the others rescued from rooftops; his mates waist deep in water walking stunned people to safety. There were the deep drifts of silt; the floating animal carcasses, the wall of water racing over the river banks towards him.

And on Monday night, when the teams started work at 6pm and didn’t stop for 24 hours, there was the darkness.

“It’s like going into a burning building, you don’t know what’s there. The trees were coming down; cars moving around; fires amongst the floods too.”

Much of the response couldn’t have happened without volunteers, Adie says, and all emergency responders have put their own lives in danger to do so.

“We all rally as one big family, that’s what gets us through.”

Of NZ’s national family of firefighters, 85% are volunteers who cover 93% of the country’s land mass, according to United Fire Brigades' Association chairman Peter Dunne. And of our 690 fire stations, about 630 of them are voluntary.

With 1700 permanently employed firefighters and 12000 volunteers, it's the latter attending most fires, road accidents and medical emergencies, though the former cabinet minister says the public often don’t know they’re trained to the same standards as their paid counterparts.

Kids help with the cleanup at Takitimu Marae in Wairoa.

“It doesn't occur to them these people are volunteers because they’re so professional in their operation.”

Just like that of the firefighters, the work of the country’s surf lifesavers has been thrust into the spotlight in past weeks. With a force made up entirely of volunteers, 172 men and women have played a part in rescues and relief from the cyclone.

In the past week, Ben McKernan, Search and Rescue Coordinator for Ruakākā Surf Lifesaving Patrol, has responded to numerous calls for help as well as evacuated residents from their ruined homes.

Volunteer Kathy Hull hugs Whirinaki resident Hayley Greig as they try to clean up after Cyclone Gabrielle tore through the small seaside town.

“They were oblivious there was half a metre of water around their house when we were knocking the door at 4.30am.”

He sees the job as his duty for Northland, saying the volunteers are in turn supported by the community.

Chris Barber hugs his brother Philip after the pair were reunited on the thick silt and mud that destroyed Chris's home when floodwaters swept through Esk Valley near Napier.

“Everyone’s doing huge hours, everyone drops off baking, we’re fed so well.”

The financial worth of NZ’s volunteer workforce is estimated at $4 billionper annum, according to ImpactLab, a company measuring social impact in Aotearoa.

That sum is made up of about 159m hours of formal volunteer labour and 7.8 m of informal work, from about 21.5% of the population.

NZ has long relied on that informal work in times of crisis, though the crucial community support so often flies under the radar.

As they always do in disasters and times of crisis, Marae have opened their doors and hearts to hundreds of whānau displaced by Gabrielle.

Mita Harris swears he’s not a hero despite his efforts rescuing people.

Terenga Paraoa Marae, also known as Kaka Porowini, has been sheltering more than 20 people per night since the storm hit, including many sleeping rough.

Marae spokesperson, Auriole Ruka (Ngāti Hine, Ngāti Manu), said her people were used to supporting whānau in times of stress.

“That's the thing about marae. Our tikanga is to manaaki our whānau and communities… the thought now is that we're putting them back out into a worse condition.”

But what this latest disaster has proved is that no matter the conditions, NZers are there for each other. Just as the tales of extraordinary resilience are still emerging, so are the quiet heroes who stepped up to make a difference.

There’s the “extreme courage and skill” of a pilot who balanced his helicopter on one skid for a rooftop rescue; the Northland couple who kayaked to reach cut-off Kaipara residents; the many people who threw open their doors to shelter survivors.

And as the people of the North continue to help each other, the rest of Aoteraoa is racing to help. Donations are flooding in, supply drives are on their way and collections points have sprung up around the country.

On Friday, Dave Eliason was part of a convoy heading north with supplies collected from the yards of Goodmans Contractors on the Kāpiti Coast. The company has employees in regions affected by the cyclone and what started with a call for Waikanae staff to donate what they could, became a community effort.

“We’ve got three utes towing three trailers; about three tonnes of food as well as blankets, clothes, toiletries, water, fuel and gas bottles.”

This load is going to be handed over to other Goodman staff further up the line who’ll take it further north.

“Then we’ll turn around and go back for more.”

The devastation will still be there when they do, just as the remarkable stories of bravery and community courage are certain to keep on coming.

Back in the north, Mita Harris (Ngāpuhi) brushes off any suggestions he’s a hero, laughing at the very idea.

During the height of the cyclone, the KeriKeri man fielded a call to help a woman in labour get to Bay of Islands hospital from south of Kawakawa. Jumping into his Unimog, Harris picked up a midwife before rescuing the woman and her whānau from a ute on a flooded road.

It was just one of many transfers the KeriKeri man, along with fellow driver Ari Burt and daughter Hana Harris, have undertaken since the storm, though the Unimog has been used for years to help Northland people.

That’s the reason he got it in the first place, he says. It’s just what Kiwis do.

“I’ve been giving it a clean this arvo, so it’s ready to go again.”