Roofs lift off homes as tornado and thunderstorms tear through Tasman region

A homeowner whose place was in the firing line of a tornado says the damage left behind is “unbelievable”.

Petra Way resident Kenny Cripps’ home has been left in a “wreck” following a tornado that touched down in the Tasman region on Monday afternoon.

Houses have lost roofs, trees have been ripped down, and power was lost to many residents as the severe weather washed over region.

About 50 properties were impacted by the tornado that went through the region at 1.20pm, Fire and Emergency New Zealand said.

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Cripps’ home is in one of the most impacted areas.

He received the news of the tornado from his wife around 1pm, who was hysterical as she told him how the road was ripped up, roofs were gone and trees had been uprooted.

“[I] couldn’t believe it really, it’s just something you just don’t think could happen, something on telly that’s it,” Cripps said.

“With the tree through the roof there and with the tornado coming through the road it just picked up all the tar seal and then just hit my house like a machine gun.”

He and others from the street were helping to put up tarpaulins as makeshift roofs.

They hoped they could stay at the home, but if power wasn’t restored they may have to find somewhere else.

FENZ stated in an update just after 4.30pm the worst hit area was Upper Moutere, with some roads in the area, including Petra Way, closed to residents and emergency services only.

“There have been no reports of serious injuries … but roofs have been partially or fully lifted on many properties, while others have been impacted by falling trees or powerlines being down.”

”Additionally, a tree fell onto a car with a person inside in Māpua, but the person was able to get out of the car without requiring assistance and reported only minor abrasions.

”There has also been a report of a tree falling onto power lines, as well as a tree falling across a driveway.”

A police officer stationed at the end of Petra Way said access was restricted to those responding to the damage and residents.

People in the street were “rallying around to help each other out”, he said.

As he spoke a ute drove up carrying tarps for residents.

About 6 kilometres southwest on Westdale Rd, Richelle Petersen’s husband had felt the weather coming.

“[He said he] felt a change coming like a drop in temperature, then something strong was coming – you could just feel it.”

He shouted for the family to run to the garage. With a house full of large windows the garage seemed the safest place. Petersen ran to tell her son to get out of the shower.

The noise was “deafening”, Petersen said.

“It was just loud, loud wind, and rain. It felt like the windows were going to explode, the glass moved three inches.”

Also on Westdale Rd, Keith Hay described “horizontal, violent rain”.

Pine needles, ripped from the trees on the nearby forestry block, hit his windows with force. “Ping, ping, ping – like stones,” Hay said.

MetService issued a heavy rain warning and severe thunderstorm watch for the area at 12.47pm on Monday.

Heavy rain was expected to last until 6pm while the thunderstorm watch was in place until 3.30pm.

MetService meteorologist Dan Corrigan said without photo evidence the storm could not be declared as a tornado, but there was a possibility.

There was a risk of large hail, heavy downpours and damaging winds until midday on Tuesday.

“There’s a line of vigorous thunderstorms that’s fast moving west to east across Nelson, Tasman and then on to Marlborough.

“The worst of it is definitely happening right now with these particularly vigorous thunderstorms that have just moved across, but there is still a risk of more heavy showers and thunderstorms around the rest of the day going into midday tomorrow.

“What we’ve seen is there’s a risk of these strong wind gusts and fast moving thunderstorms of 80 to 100kph and then an outside risk of small tornados.

“It could be that there was some tornadic activity and if there’s footage of a funnel cloud then that’s sure evidence, but these damaging wind gusts can just occur from these really vigorous fast-moving thunderstorm cells as well.”

Fire and Emergency shift manager Blair Walklin said crews were busy responding to weather related call-outs across Nelson and Tasman.

“We had what’s been described as a twister and heavy rain go through the Nelson and Tasman area, and we’ve received multiple calls to some roofs lifting on properties.”

Travellers on State Highway 60 between Mōtueka and Richmond were experiencing delays as fallen tress forced Waka Kotahi to input stop-go measures, the Waka Kotahi website said.

A MetService post on Twitter said there were three main lines of thunderstorms all moving east.

One was crossing Nelson city, moving towards Marlborough, another was between the North and South islands, heading to Kāpiti Coast, and the other was east of Taranaki.

Network Tasman was experiencing outages across Upper and Lower Moutere, Richmond, Māpua, Takaka, Rīwaka and surrounding areas.

The largest faults had been in Golden Bay and Mōtueka, but power had since been restored, operations manager Robert Derks said.

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”It was quite a violent wee storm, it passed through quite quickly with lots of lightning and tonnes of rain.”

Derks said trees had fallen down over lines and other faults had risen during the storm, but staff were working to restore power as soon as possible.

“We’re narrowing in on the areas and I will put a post up once we now a bit more, but at the moment were still just dealing with working with what we know.”

Tasman mayor Tim King had been in contact with emergency responders who told him about the tornado that quickly tore through the region.

“It’s been an interesting morning, thunderstorm, heavy rain and strong winds,” King said.

“There was a tornado through part of tasman out towards Māpua and Mōtueka.

“Fire and Emergency NZ are managing it, so they’re running all the comms and communications. “

King urged people to keep themselves safe, stay home and only drive if necessary.

“Any time there’s wild weather just be careful driving, don’t really go out and have a nosy.”

A spokesperson for Tasman Civil Defence said staff were ready to assist the community with welfare support if necessary.