It was almost a case of being blown away at a Riverton Volunteer Fire Brigade callout this morning.
The brigade responded to two incidents caused by strong winds and then were alerted to a third.
Chief fire officer Jeremy Raines said the first callout near Orepuki was to help with roofing iron that had broken loose from a pile that had been secure but broke free in the wind.
The wind was "very forceful".
“It was strong enough that we were struggling to stand up.”
Fortunately the owner of the property had concrete fence posts handy, and the firefighters threw some of these on the pieces of iron.
“We couldn't lift the iron and move it, it would just blow it away.”
At the second incident at Tihaka, closer to Riverton, a shearing shed wall had blown down, scattering timber and iron on the road.
The firefighters cleared the road of debris and nailed down some loose roofing iron on the shed.
While the traffic was reduced to one lane a motorist advised the firefighters there was a pine branch down blocking the road.
The fire crew went to check out the scene near Round Hill about the same time as a farmer on a tractor turned up.
The branch was shifted off the road.
By the time the crew returned to the station it was raining and the wind had dropped, he said.
