essentials<\/a> being brought in on about three trips.<\/p>\n![\"Community](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/community-members-unload-supplies-from-a-helicopter-at-ngawi-A6MIOUKZXBEAPM2SGJOTRSY7RA.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Community members unload supplies from a helicopter at Ngawi golf course. (Source: Local Democracy Reporting)<\/p>\n
One person had been evacuated by helicopter.<\/p>\n
“The first helicopter drop had urgent medication. We evacuated a woman from Whatarangi who needed an operation.<\/p>\n
“We have toddlers here, and we needed baby formula, nappies, bread, milk and more medication,” she said.<\/p>\n
Hayes said the community was resilient, but needed the bridge.<\/p>\n
“This is an amazing community. Everyone helps each other.<\/p>\n
“There are a lot of businesses here that rely on that bridge being functional, including the lobster and fishing industries, and the camping village.”<\/p>\n
Meanwhile the Lake Ferry community were pleased the bridge over the T\u016branganui River was open.<\/p>\n
Resident Vicky Prout estimated it had opened about 6pm on Wednesday, and people had quickly gotten back on the road.<\/p>\n
“People are pretty relieved they can just get back to normal and have their wh\u0101nau home. They are happy the community support was there and everyone worked well together.<\/p>\n
“The traffic was quite heavy coming past here after the bridge opened, in and out.”<\/p>\n
A group had arranged a food drop for locals.<\/p>\n
“We were happy with our box of food that we got. We had a chip sandwich for dinner.”<\/p>\n
The store in Pirinoa had been key in providing supplies to the stranded communities.<\/p>\n
![\"Dave](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/dave-pillar-the-co-owner-of-the-pirinoa-general-store-was-pa-565D6VIBRRDBXIZ4IHFJKK7BJE.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Dave Pillar, the co-owner of the Pirinoa General Store, was part of the team that helped get supplies through to hundreds of people stranded on the South Wairarapa coast. (Source: Local Democracy Reporting)<\/p>\n
Dave Pillar and his partner own the Pirinoa Community Store, to the north of the T\u016branganui River bridge.<\/p>\n
“The shop was the saviour,” said one resident who asked not to be named.<\/p>\n
PIllar said during the crisis the shop was taking orders over the phone and online<\/p>\n
“The bridge went out and people started discussing how we would get stuff over to the other side of the bridge. There was a human chain set up, and people were ringing orders through and just loading up bags to go down there and ferry it across.<\/p>\n
“We were running it down to the bridge from this side. Anyone heading that way was stopping in and getting loaded up. There were a lot of people doing runs.”<\/p>\n
Stranded settlements dealing with loss of power and access to supplies and essential services.\u00a0 (Source: TVNZ)<\/p>\n
Pillar estimated between 20 and 30 runs had been done all up.<\/p>\n
“It was medications, food, nappies, personal supplies and fresh water mainly.”<\/p>\n
PIllar said the store became the hub to get things through, but the community had done the heavy lifting.<\/p>\n
“It was all community that did this. It was Pirinoa side supporting Lake Ferry residents.”<\/p>\n
Local Democracy Reporting is local-body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"People have praised the council and the community after a bridge at Lake Ferry reopened late on Wednesday…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":291278,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[3092,42,43,40,38,41,39,52],"class_list":{"0":"post-291277","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-floods","9":"tag-headlines","10":"tag-news","11":"tag-top-news","12":"tag-top-stories","13":"tag-topnews","14":"tag-topstories","15":"tag-wellington"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/291277","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=291277"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/291277\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/291278"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=291277"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=291277"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=291277"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}