The raw sewage polluting the capital’s sea: Who knew what, and when, about Wellington’s broken wastewater plant
Friday, 6 February 2026
With raw sewage continuing to pour into the ocean along Wellington's south coast, Stuff takes a closer look at the timeline of events following the failure at the Moa Point wastewater treatment plant, and asks whether the public should have found out about it sooner.
Early on Wednesday morning, Grace Howells was walking her dog on the beach, right by the Moa Point wastewater treatment plant, as raw sewage from the facility was spilling into the ocean.
She had no idea it was happening, but by sheer luck, did not allow her pet to have her daily morning swim.
“She is like a hippo usually. She just gets in. I feel very relieved I was being boring and didn’t let her go in the water,” Howells told Stuff.
It wasn’t until around 11am she knew anything was wrong. The notification came from Wellington Water in the form of a leaflet in her letterbox, advising residents not to swim, but it didn’t say why.
The notice, which she showed to Stuff, “advised” residents to stay out of the water, not to collect fish,, and to consult Land Air Water Aotearoa before swimming.
However, the fault that led to the sewage leak began many hours before that. Wellington Water said approximately 1am.
“As people who live right next to the plant, we should have been informed straight away the reason,” she said.
“I’m quite sad, because it’s summer. And I don’t want to be a spoilt first-world Kiwi or anything, but one of the reasons I love living in Wellington is the sea.”
Surfer Jana Barrett was watching the beach from afar on Thursday, and said she was “grieving” and “really emotional” that she could not get in the water.
“This is just devastating, this is our community, this is our mental health strategy. It is outrageous, how, in 2026, is there no technology to prevent this happening?” she said.
Beach-lover Bibi Hawkes echoed that sentiment, saying she “loved” the ocean, which was like her “therapy”, and had “big beach plans” this weekend.
“I have come down to grieve and mourn and to see it with my own eyes. We have totally failed to look after this precious taonga,” she said
On Thursday, Wellington Mayor Andrew Little said an inquiry would be taking place, but would not comment on who knew what, and when, before that happened.
“How the matter was alerted to Wellington Water… What they knew, what they did, when they notified others, when information went out, when the public was notified, all of those issues need to be the subject of the investigation,” he said.
Other councillors - including deputy mayor Ben McNulty and councillor Diane Calvert - said further investigation was needed, but stood by Wellington Water and the council’s response so far.
“It feels, on the face of it, that we were informed in a timely way. What’s important is understanding the scale of the issue, and staff worked hard to get as much information out as soon as possible. Council officers completely prioritised it,” Calvert said.
So, what do we know about what happened, and when?
Wednesday 1am: Equipment fails
Fire and Emergency NZ were alerted to an incident at the Moa Point Wastewater Treatment Plant around 1am on Wednesday morning.
The plant is owned by Wellington City Council and operated by Wellington Water, which contracts a company called Veolia to carry out operations.
Wellington Water chief executive Pat Dougherty said the plant’s long outfall - a 1.8-kilometre pipe that carries treated wastewater to the Cook Strait - backed up and flooded the plant’s lower levels.
The flooding caused a power outage, rendering the plant entirely inoperable.
Wednesday 6.30am: Facebook post
At 6.30am on Wednesday morning, Wellington Water took to Facebook to warn the public that untreated wastewater was being discharged just metres from the shoreline.
The Facebook page has 18,000 followers.
“Because of mechanical failure within the plant … there is an ongoing discharge of untreated wastewater. This will emerge at the short outfall into the ocean at Tarakena Bay. The discharge may cause the water to appear cloudy or murky,” the post read.
“Investigations are underway. We’ve placed warning signs at the stormwater outlet. Wellington Water recommends all recreational water users follow the advice of Land, Air, Water Aotearoa.”
The post was one of three published to the page within seven minutes.
The others warned of fully treated wastewater being discharged into Waiwhetu Stream and screened wastewater being discharged into Karori Stream following heavy rain.
Wellington Mayor Andrew Little was also notified of the incident around this time.
“Sometime between 6 and 6.30 [Wednesday] morning I was told that there had been a sewage leak. That was the information I got,” he told Stuff.
“It was probably a couple of hours later that I was then advised that the gravity of the situation was much greater, and around then I was told that it was basically an entire plant failure.”
Wednesday 8.53am: Councillors notified
Just before 9am on Wednesday, Wellington councillors received an email from the council’s chief infrastructure officer.
“This morning Wellington Water Limited (WWL) advised us of an incident at Moa Point Wastewater Treatment Plant. Overnight, whilst work was being done on the UV lines, the controls failed and the circuit boards and breakers tripped, meaning electricity was cut off to the system. As a result, all raw sewage is currently diverted to the short outfall at Moa Point,” it read.
“Wellington Electricity then cut off all electricity to the site as the risk was too great. Moa Point Wastewater Treatment Plant remains without electricity this morning.”
The email went on to state that Wellington Water’s emergency team was working to restore power to the long outfall system as a priority.
“WWL will lead the communications from an operational perspective,” it said.
Four minutes before this email, at 8.49am, Wellington City Council posted a warning to their Facebook page: “SEWAGE DISCHARGE AT MOA POINT – STAY OUT OF BEACHES ON THE SOUTH COAST”.
This page has 91,000 followers.
The post said Wellington Water staff were out distributing flyers and speaking with the local community. It directed people to the Wellington Water Facebook page for updates.
Wednesday 11am: Press release
At 11.10am, a Wellington Water spokesperson said they put out an alert to the media.
This cleared up a previous discrepancy in the timeline - the equipment failure started at 1am, not 3am, as previously stated.
“We strongly advise the community to stay away from the south coast beaches. There is currently untreated wastewater being discharged into the water and this may occur for some time.
“Public health signage is being erected at Lyall Bay and the south coast beaches. We’re asking the public not to enter the water or collect kai moana. A rāhui will be placed over the affected area.”
Around this time, Little also received a fuller briefing from the agency.
It was also around this time that a local resident said she received the flyer notifying her of the incident. This warned her to stay out of the water, but not why.
When Stuff asked Wellington Water why this information was omitted, they denied that it had been.
“That is not accurate, the flyers did say there had been an ‘untreated wastewater discharge’,” a spokesperson said.
Presented with a photo of the flyer, which did not include a reason, they said Howell’s flyer may have been one of the “initial” ones handed out.
“It was a dynamic situation yesterday and our teams were having to adapt and pivot to suit the magnitude of the event,” they said.
“Be rest assured, we are pulling out all the stops to ensure there is enough signage and flyers in the affected areas.”
Wednesday 1.30pm: Press conference
Dougherty, Little and Wellington Water’s person in charge of wastewater held a press conference outlining the extent of the plant’s failure.
“The biggest impact is going to be on Wellingtonians being denied use of the south coast for the next few weeks, if not months,” Dougherty said.
He confirmed that Wellington Water did not know when untreated wastewater would be diverted back to the long outfall, or how long the capital’s southern beaches would be out of access.
Little said that Wellington Harbour was safe to swim in, but warned residents not to swim or take their children and dogs to the south coast beaches.
Wednesday 4.30pm
A Stuff reporter at Lyall Bay reported there were several beach accesses without signs warning people against entering the water.
Thursday
A Wellington City Council spokesperson confirmed that ensuring “as many signs are up along the coastline as practically possible” was a work in progress.
Friday
Wellington Water partially fixes the long outfall pipe it needs to stop untreated sewage being pumped into the south coast, but for now, wastewater continues to flow into the sea during “peak flows”.
“We strongly advise that people avoid the coastal area along the south of Wellington until further notice. Do not enter the water or collect kaimoana from this area. Do not walk your dog along the beach,” Wellington Water board chair, Nick Leggett, said.