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Auckland Central MP Chlöe Swarbrick says frontline firefighters wanted to stand up a “heavy rescue team” the night before torrential rain once again flooded Auckland, but weren’t given the go-ahead until 10.30am on Tuesday.
Swarbrick, in Wellington for a sitting of Parliament, said she had heard directly from crew at the Auckland Central fire station that they put a request out for such a rescue team to be stood up, but “they encountered some issues in feeding that up the food chain”.
New Zealand Professional Firefighters’ Union Auckland secretary Martin Campbell told Stuff he was frustrated that firefighters “constantly have to play catch-up in emergency events”.
“Once again, our teams have been left chasing their tails,” Campbell said.
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“During today’s flooding event Fenz only decided to stand up the technical rescue tender with staffing at 11.15am, after the rain had started and the emergency calls were coming in.
“Less than 30 minutes later, this rescue truck was responding to a cliff collapse north of Auckland.”
A senior Fire and Emergency New Zealan source added that “once again we’re scrambling – no prior planning was undertaken”.
A state of emergency was called by Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown at 1pm on Tuesday as torrential rainfall flooded parts of the city – four months after severe flooding killed four people. Some weather stations in the region recorded 40 to 50mm of rainfall in a single hour.
Swarbrick challenged Emergency Management Minister Kieran McAnulty in the House later on Tuesday about whether firefighters were sufficiently able to respond to the event.
ROBERT KITCHIN/Stuff
Auckland Central MP Chlöe Swarbrick has questioned whether frontline firefighters were allowed to properly prepare for Tuesday’s torrential rain.
She asked if he was “confident or comfortable with the flow of communication and the decisions that are being made with regard to, or not with enough regard to, the needs and the points as raised by those on the front line?”
McAnulty said the Internal Affairs Minister Barbara Edmonds, responsible for the firefighters, “was in touch with the national commander and that they have assured us that, as is always case, whenever urban search and rescue capacity is required, it will be dispatched”.
“There may be a difference of opinion around when is the appropriate time or if, indeed, it is required, but we do continue to have confidence in Fire and Emergency New Zealand.”
Speaking to reporters outside the House, Swarbrick said she had notified Edmonds about the request from firefighters on Monday evening.
“As of this morning, I was told that subsequent to a meeting that heavy rescue was finally set up, but I think that we can all appreciate the frustration that someone frontline may feel, given the put those requests out late last night and they weren’t responded to until this morning.”
Tāmaki Makaurau on-call commander for Fire and Emergency, Brad Mosby, said the rescue truck was “always ready to be operationally available from its current station”.
He said that although the truck wasn’t usually staffed, it could be when requested.
The truck was provided to Urban Search and Rescue teams at 10.30am, he said.
Auckland Emergency Management (AEM) Deputy Controller Rachel Kelleher said the severe weather was expected to clear after 7pm.
AEM has opened Civil Defence centres and shelters in the city, find the latest information here.
Correction: A previous version of this story named the internal affairs minister as Jan Tinetti. Barbara Edmonds is minister of internal affairs. (Tuesday, May 9, 2023 at 6:58PM)
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