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The Nelson Photo News

 

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Brook Stream Was Raging Torrent

The Brook Stream is normally quite a placid little stream, although in the recent past it has shown a tendency to scour at times of heavy rainfall. On this occasion, however, its fury knew no bounds. The overflow from the reservoir, augmented by the rushing waters of flooded creeks and culverts, quickly raised the water to an unprecedented level. And in its rampaging voyage through Brook Street, Brookside and to the Maitai River it carved great hunks out of the roadway, smashed down concrete bridges, tore away the approaches to public bridges, undermined houses and sheds and knifed off a corner of the primer block at St. Joseph's Convent School. And it killed. Mrs J. E. McCartney, attempting to aid in opening a jammed door, was swept away to her death. Her body was recovered close to the Municipal Pool. But the catastrophe here, and at Nile Street, had a side effect. It proved conclusively that at a time of disaster the Nelson people are not only prepared to come forward to help, but are eager to do so. It proved too that the Nelson Civil Defence organisation, which took over control of the emergency, was more than adequate. Undoubtedly the organisation will have learned a great deal. Undoubtedly, too, the population as a whole will also have learned that without a central organisation to co-ordinate emergency forces, the disaster in Nelson could well have been very much greater. Here is an appropriate place to congratulate the organisation on its untiring efforts; the City Council staff in every department; the staff of Government departments which worked just as hard; and those firms which offered heavy machinery, and the volunteers who turned out in the thousands.

This picture, taken on the Sunday morning, shows some of the extent of the damage to Brook Street by the flood waters.

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Undoubtedly the Brook Street area was the hardest hit of all. Every type of service, telephone, gas, electricity, water and sewerage were cut by the floods. Many homes were evacuated because of the lack of services and people were ordered from their hornes because of the danger. The loss of water from the Maitai system (the supply line was cut in four places in the Brook Stream alone) was perhaps the greatest problem. Water tanks and milk tankers were placed at strategic points in the affected areas. But the city coped. Above-Restoring telephone Communications across the Seymour Road bridge on the Sunday morning.

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The badly undermined home of Mr and Mrs J. A. McArtney, 74 Bronte Street. It was from this house that Mrs McArtney senior was swept to her death. Further upstream, sheds and hornes were undermined and smashed.

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For a time the only link residents around the Westbrook Terrace area had with the outside world was this concrete gutter, linking West-brook Terrace with the terrace bridge. Here the flood waters cut through the western approach to the bridge and found a new channel along what was the roadway of Westbrook Terrace. Residents now have their frontages directly on to the stream.

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The Brook Street butchery had its foundations badly undermined by flood waters and at one stage appeared ready to topple into the stream. Because of a danger that the building might block the stream it was demolished.

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Water foreman Peter Graves working on an emergency in a water line in Brook Street (taps were placed at regular intervals on the pipeline).

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After all the valuable equipment had been removed, the butchery, owned by Mr J. L. Borlase, was demolished as a safety measure.

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Surging past Bronte Street and around Brookside, the stream carved a massive chunk of land alongside the grounds of Sacred Heart College and St. Joseph 's Convent School and in doing so it tore down a corner of the school's primer block

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A close-up view of the damage to the school after the flood waters had subsided.

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Wash day for a Brookside resident

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A heavy concrete bridge linking Brough's Nursery with Brook Street collapsed when the approaches were undermined and flood waters cut sharply into the frontage of the home of Mr and Mrs Vic Jensen.

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A view up Brook Street from the western side of Seymour Avenue bridge

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Staff of the Council's electricity department hard at it preparing a new site for a power pole in Brook Street

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Water for local residents from a milk tanker