Canterbury Flooding

 Canterbury Flooding

Heavy rain continues to fall in Canterbury, raising fears of further evacuations and flooding, particularly in Ashburton where half of the town's residents are preparing to leave their homes. 

MetService has a code-red warning in place for Canterbury as the deluge is expected to bring up to 400mm to the high country by Monday afternoon. A red warning is its highest alert level and has only been issued once before.

People have been evacuated in Springfield, the Upper and Lower Selwyn Huts and in Peel Forest, while people trapped by floodwaters have been rescued in multiple locations.

Late this evening, Waimakariri District Council said the Eyre River stopbanks are now expected to fail and 133 households along the river from Wolffs Road and north of the river to North Eyre Road must evacuate immediately.

The Ashley River stopbank is also at risk of failure and 100 Fernside residents between Mt Thomas Road, Oxford Road and Merton Road should also evacuate immediately. Another eight households near Kairaki Beach are also being evacuated.

The Mandeville Sports Centre and Rangiora Baptist Church have been set up as evacuation centres.

Geraldine Retirement Village has also been evacuated as a precaution, a staff member said.

Many roads, including some sections of state highways, are closed, while more than 70 schools, kura and early learning services in Canterbury have confirmed they will be closed tomorrow.

Ashburton, Timaru and Selwyn have all declared a civil defence emergency.

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and i hope that this storm doesn't come back