Six months on from Cyclone Gabrielle, life yet to return to normal for many

Six months on from Cyclone Gabrielle and the piles of silt no longer sit at the roadside in Puketapu, west of Napier. 

Contractors' heavy machinery rolls along the roads and green shoots and grass are taking over the mud, but among the bustle of the rebuild are those still waiting to see what the future holds.

Checkpoint has returned to Hawke's Bay to catch up with people we interviewed in the aftermath of Cyclone Gabrielle, a severe tropical storm that left 11 dead and devastated large areas of the North Island, including Puketapu.

The village itself is still in recovery mode, but there are signs of progress, such as the reopened pub.

In the valley behind, along Dartmoor Road, Emma Tuck and her family clung to the top of their roof as the floodwater raged around them on 14 February.

They had smashed a hole in their ceiling and climbed to the top.

Tuck said they were actually prepared for a storm - buying bottled water and securing plants and other wind-prone items on their section. Her mother Kerry Hamlin stayed the night in Hastings rather than staying in her flat on the property.

What they were not prepared for was the ferocity of what unfolded.

After a five-hour ordeal Tuck her partner, aunty and four children were rescued by helicopter.

"I'm finding as time goes on my memory's kind of bringing more back. So, early days it was like, 'This is what happened', and now I can go into more detail. 

"I still don't believe that we got up through that roof. We sat there and we were just hoping for dear life that a call to mum was actually going to get a helicopter to save us, because we knew from here there was nowhere to go."

There house still lies ruined, red stickered as not fit for habitation and on land classified as category 3, meaning it is not suitable for rebuilding.

It has a gaping hole in its front, into where Tuck said her bedroom used to be.

She and her family were staying in Napier seaside suburb Westshore, but she still runs her business from their Dartmoor Road property, where they have their hearts set on returning to live if a change is made to its classification.

"This is home. I want to come home and my kids want to come home. They talk abut Westshore being their 'now home', but they keep asking, 'When's granddad going to fix our real home so we can go to our real home'. That breaks my heart."

When RNZ first spoke to Tuck, she and her family were combing through the silt to see if they could salvage belongings a week after their rooftop ordeal.

But Hamlin did not get that chance - her flat was completely washed away.

"I did find a container about 8 kilometres away - all battered and bruised - and I managed to salvage some clothes to wear to my granddaughter's 21st," Hamlin said.

"But I haven't found my bed or my fridge or anything like that - just a bracelet really, and a couple of bottles of perfume that were in my room.

"It's really starting from scratch for me. Some days it hurts. Some days it's like, 'Oh well, you can't dwell on it'."

She also faces a long drive to see her family and said she missed being around her grandchildren every day.

A few days ago, Hamlin and Tuck went over the text messages they sent each other on 14 February.

Tuck was trying to reassure her relatives that she was fine at the very moment she thought her time was up.

"Even talking to people as it comes up, people say, 'Did you really feel like you were over?' Well, there was a point that my children said to me, 'Mum, when I die can I hold your hand?' I just said, 'Hold my hand'.

"We thought we were gone. We had nowhere to go. At that point we were like nobody's coming. This is us, but we're together."

The house was shaking due to the water's force and the family were worried large items such as containers or logs could smash into it.

In February, Tuck explained how the family drew inspiration from daughter Bayleigh Takie, who died as a baby 12 years ago.

When the floodwater started climbing above the house's guttering they sang the song that reminded them of Bayleigh, You Are My Sunshine, and the level fell.

Now, Tuck said her mood wet up and down, but she was staying strong for her children.

In Puketapu village, Olly Midgley and his wife were rescued from their house by kayak.

In the days after the cyclone household items were drying out the back.

Six months on, some items were still there, as Midgley and his wife work through their belongings to see what they can salvage and what has to go.

Crucially, they can rebuild on their land and hope to start soon, before they think about a cottage on their property that also suffered damage.

Inside the house the walls have been stripped above the 1.9-metre mark the water reached.

"It's dried out, but the floors - the timber is cupped, so it needs to be ripped up, which is a crazy shame.

"The builder cut the gib at 2.4 metres, which is a gib-square size, so he's made a beautiful job of starting the resurrection process," Midgley said.

After five months living on their property in a camper van, he and his wife were now in a rental close by, but did not anticipate staying there for too much longer.

"I think we could be finished by Christmas. Originally we thought it was going to be maybe one or two years... [The builders] could rush in here and chip away at it pretty quickly."

He had plenty of work to do in the back yard, where water sat for a long time. Some trees were dead or dying, and the lawn will need replanting, on top of the remaining silt.

From the rental where they were staying, there was also work that could be done.

"[We're] cleaning stuff, tidying stuff - all the silver, all the kitchen cutlery has been sitting outside for five months. 

"It's only now we've got somewhere to deal to it, the process of water blasting your cutlery. 

"You put it in the dishwasher - wow, the silt does not come off. You've got to water blast it and polish each individual piece in the sink."

In Midgley's garage now were more household items waiting to be sorted, but on 14 February there were two vintage cars.

They were submerged, but one was back on the road and the other was about to be fixed.

The outlook was brighter for Midgley in Puketapu.

"This was yesterday. Today's a different day. We will 100 percent be able to rebuild and stay here," he said, while expressing sympathy for those not as fortunate.

For Tuck, Hamlin and their family, they were waiting for something to change, living in hope they can return home and be together again.