Three floods in 11 months leave Little River couple facing $100,000 bill to protect ‘forever home’

Saturday, 13 June 2026

Tricia Hewlett thought she knew how high Little River’s floodwaters could rise when she rebuilt after moving into her new home last year. Then February's flood came and swept through everything.

Four months after floods tore through Little River, residents are still picking up the pieces – and trying to fortify their “forever homes” in the face of future floods.

The community was one of two to suffer serious damage as Banks Peninsula was driven into a local state of emergency, after it was hit by five months’ worth of rain in just 35 hours.

Rapid building assessments by the Christchurch City Council saw one property in Little River red-stickered, meaning it was damaged so badly it was unsafe to enter; one yellow-stickered; and two white-stickered. In nearby Wainui, three properties remained red-stickered, and one yellow-stickered as of last month.

Hewlett, a wildlife artist, said her Little River home was never issued a notice, but she still faces a significant wait before she can move back in. She and partner Paul Newport, who works at Hinewai Reserve, are now living in a campervan in their yard while the flood damage is repaired.

But this wasn’t their first brush with weather-related disaster. In December 2021, they were living in Hinewai’s Ōtānerito Homestead when extreme rain caused a gully to collapse into the valley.

“It was like a tsunami of trees and rocks coming towards the house,” she said. The couple were ultimately OK, but she said February’s flood “brought all that back”.

“We only moved in last year, and in the first 11 months we were here, we had three floods.”

Tricia Hewlett and Paul Newport at their Little River home, which was badly damaged by floodwaters during the Little River floods earlier this year.

Hewlett thought the first was “a blessing in disguise”, as locals told them that was the highest the floodwaters ever got. They built up and outfitted their new home using that level as a benchmark.

“[But] this time the floodwaters came much higher, and just took out everything – really went through everything in the house,” she said.

“Part of the problem that people don’t think about is that the water is actually going in and out of everybody’s septic tanks, and we’re down valley.

“It’s all blackwater, which means that a few days after the flood, before anything could be sorted or anything like that, it was starting to get really smelly… It was pretty awful.”

The couple are slowly repairing the property and plan to raise the house to reduce the risk of future flooding.

It also meant repairing the damage went far beyond just pulling up the carpets. They had to have flooring and walls removed, insulation pulled out, and even some of their plumbing and electrical systems replaced.

Packing everything up, and dealing with insurers, builders, and the various other contractors needed to make their home liveable again had been a long and “convoluted” process.

“At one point I counted that I had 51 contacts on my phone from all the people we’ve been dealing with relating to the flood.”

Until it happens to them, most people probably did not think about how drawn out the whole process was – and how many “silly obstacles” they would face, she said.

“You think get in, start sorting … but you can’t pack anything because you haven’t got boxes.

They say they love living in Little River, and intend to spend the rest of their lives there.

“You can’t put cardboard on wet carpet, so then we needed tarps. Then we needed somewhere to put it all. So a couple of days later we bought a container and got that in.

“Finally a week goes past, the house is rotting and everything’s just smelly and fly-ridden, and that’s when you start packing up.”

Once the insurance-funded repairs are complete, Hewlett and Newport plan to have their house lifted.

They are trying to keep the cost under $100,000, as Hewlett said the flood has caused some major hiccups to her income, art and business – including losing her car.

But for her, the expense was worth it to be able to stay in the town they loved. Little River was rural, but not isolated. Small, but always had plenty going on.

“It’s the people really… the sense of community, the support,” she said,

“As long as the sea temperature keeps rising, we’re going to get more cyclones and we’re going to get more floods. That’s why we’re lifting our house.

“We are making ourselves resilient, because this is our forever home. We chose this house to be our last home.”