Residents despair at damage

Emotions were running high for some South Dunedin residents yesterday as their properties were flooded by a relentless stream of sewage.

"We’re up s... creek with no paddle," Surrey St resident Isaac Nyman said.

"Possessions and houses are going to be wrecked."

Mr Nyman said he and his partner had been up from 6am to 9pm on Thursday barricading the front of their driveway, before water started flowing towards them and slowly increasing.

"After that it was pretty much all over."

Mr Nyman said they had been at the Dunedin Ice Stadium carpark until the early hours of yesterday morning, helping others fill sandbags.

Shortly after, he and his partner evacuated their children to their grandparents’ house, while the pair stayed at the property overnight.

He had only slept for two hours, and got up at 4am in case they needed to move anything in the house, Mr Nyman said.

He called the situation a "repeat" of the 2015 floods.

"We’ve had coming up nearly 10 years to work this out, and I feel like the council has f..... it up again.

"They can only do what they can do at the end of the day ... but I thought there might have been some sort of system that could have prevented the certain streets that do get wrecked."

He said the water lapping at his doorstep contained sewage.

"I’m just hoping that everybody has kind of band together, and at the end of this the government comes to hand-in-hand on how many people have lost their stuff."

Loyalty St resident Navjot Dhillon said she had "never" seen anything like yesterday’s flooding.

Mrs Dhillon, who lived in Christchurch during the 2011 earthquake, said she and her family moved to Dunedin last year.

"This experience is horrible.

"We couldn’t sleep from last night — just only a two-hour sleep."

A leak in her ceiling had meant water had entered a bedroom and a storeroom, which was "very bad" and had affected the carpet.

The rest of the interior was fine, but water had entered the rental property from the rear of the house.

"The back is just all water."

Meanwhile, a children’s bicycle and rubbish bins floated in her front yard.

They were arranging for more sandbags to be brought to the house, she said.

Mrs Dhillon said the flooding had been scarier for her two children, aged 11 and 4.

The Dunedin City Council did not respond to questions by deadline as it was focused on supporting the community yesterday.

tim.scott@odt.co.nz