Auckland flooding: Man's car stolen as he delivered pizza to emergency shelter
Sunday, 29 January 2023
A local board member had his car stolen while he was delivering pizzas to an emergency centre dealing with the fallout of the Auckland flooding.
Jon Turner, who sits on the Puketāpapa Local Board, had just delivered 20 pizzas on Saturday when his partner called with bad news – their car was gone from outside their home.
He had bought the food from Domino's Pizza in Sandringham for the families and support team staffing an emergency centre at Wesley Primary School.
Some 18 people were gathered there after their homes were inundated with water amid record-setting rainfall on January 27.
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It’s become a base of operations for local volunteers handling food parcels and emergency housing, as well as collecting and distributing donations.
“We were just sitting down to have kai, and talk, and my partner rang saying the car is gone. So I rushed home and yep, it was gone,” Turner said.
“My first thought was it must have flooded away, but no. It’s gone.”
He has no camera footage and neighbours weren’t able to shed any light on the situation either.
Turner said he usually kept a steering lock on his car – a commonly stolen Toyota Aqua – but he had a sinking suspicion that after the effort to get home from the cancelled Elton John concert on Friday, he might have forgotten.
“So potentially I didn't put it on, and someone was opportunistic, came along and took it.”
He said luckily for him there was nothing valuable inside the car.
Police have confirmed they are aware of the alleged theft.
As a local board member, Turner said he felt a responsibility to start helping once it became clear that Friday’s deluge was becoming a city-wide disaster.
After a two-hour slog to get home from the cancelled concert, Turner stayed up until early on Saturday to try and set up a local scout hall for emergency accommodation, and searching for other ways to help.
He finally thought he would get a longer sleep on Saturday, but instead found himself awake in the middle of the night, “feeling gutted, as you can imagine”.
But it won't stop the board member from pressing on with serving the community.
Wesley Primary School’s efforts in the wake of the floods were honoured with a visit from Deputy Prime Minister Carmel Sepuloni, after being visited by Minister Michael Wood on Saturday.