{"id":243907,"date":"2026-01-21T06:24:10","date_gmt":"2026-01-21T06:24:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/243907\/"},"modified":"2026-01-21T06:24:10","modified_gmt":"2026-01-21T06:24:10","slug":"neighbours-pluck-94yo-man-from-tairua-flooding-as-community-bands-together","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/243907\/","title":{"rendered":"Neighbours pluck 94yo man from Tairua flooding, as community bands together"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"No<\/p>\n

\nFlooding in the Coromandel Peninsula has spread throughout the day.
\nPhoto: Supplied \/ Thames-Coromandel District Council\n<\/p>\n

A Palmerston North woman is praising a “community of carers’ who came to the rescue of her elderly dad on the flooded Coromandel Peninsula.<\/p>\n

A precautionary state of emergency is in place, after a tropical storm<\/a> swept over the area, flooding houses and campgrounds, and cutting off roads.<\/p>\n

Debbie Gray’s 94-year-old father was staying at a Tairua bach, when heavy rain started to flood the garage.<\/p>\n

Her father was unable to open the garage, with water both inside and surrounding it.<\/p>\n

As the weather wasn’t improving, Gray put out an ‘SOS’ on the Tairua community Facebook page to see if anyone could get to him and open the garage.<\/p>\n

\"Hikuai<\/p>\n

\nHikuai flooding on the Coromandel Peninsula.
\nPhoto: Supplied\n<\/p>\n

“I see that Tairua is flooded, but if he has a car, he could move out of the danger zone,” she wrote.<\/p>\n

Gray said she had an incredible response from the community.<\/p>\n

“I tell you what, the people were amazing,” she said.<\/p>\n

“Honestly, within five minutes, I had responses of ‘we’re heading down there now, we’ve seen him, the car’s out’, so I just can’t say enough for that community – it just rallies around.”<\/p>\n

Gray said this wasn’t the first time the community had banded together to check on their neighbours.<\/p>\n

\"Heavy<\/p>\n

\nCoromandel land slip, November 2025.
\nPhoto: Supplied \/ Mieke Kregting\n<\/p>\n

“I remember [Cyclone] Gabrielle – and even the one before that – the community just seem to pull together and support one another with things like ‘get out and check on your neighbours, and look out for each other’,<\/p>\n

“It’s just incredible.”<\/p>\n

Her father’s car was taken out of the garage and moved to a dryer spot, Gray said, and his house hadn’t flooded.<\/p>\n

She said it was comforting to know people on Facebook were prepared to care for others.<\/p>\n

“People heading down and they’ve shared it around, so obviously there’s more than one or two,” Gray said. “There’s a community of carers up there doing amazing work.”<\/p>\n

Sign up for Ng\u0101 Pitopito K\u014drero<\/a>, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Flooding in the Coromandel Peninsula has spread throughout the day. Photo: Supplied \/ Thames-Coromandel District Council A Palmerston…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":243908,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[48,47,42,43,49,46,44,45,40,38,41,39],"class_list":{"0":"post-243907","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-audio","9":"tag-current-affairs","10":"tag-headlines","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-podcasts","13":"tag-public-radio","14":"tag-radio-new-zealand","15":"tag-rnz","16":"tag-top-news","17":"tag-top-stories","18":"tag-topnews","19":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243907","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=243907"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243907\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/243908"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=243907"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=243907"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=243907"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}