New Zealand Herald, the - APN Holdings NZ Limited

Hawke’s Bay Regional Council (HBRC) is adopting a one-in-500-year flood strategy for the repair and rebuild of the region’s stopbanks.

The furious storms over the summer have served to expose a number of weaknesses in the infrastructure of our major cities and towns.

Australia and California both experience major wildfires, yet the former is far ahead of the United States in relation to its early warning systems.

New Zealand's rising fire danger prompts questions about how prepared communities are for big blazes, and whether development should be allowed in high-risk places.

New research warns that an abnormal marine heatwave and record-hot temperatures that warmed up New Zealand last summer are a taste of the country's possible future under climate change. The effects are expected to be dramatic, with early snow melt, major disruptions of marine ecosystems, and very early maturation of wine grapes.

According to new research, an Auckland eruption could force the evacuation of more than 400,000 people - but the biggest risk to life would come with a fast-rolling, bomb-like surge of hot rock and gas. This news comes in light of attempts to provide emergency managers with simple and clear information to support their decisions about how many people to evacuate.

This time last year Aucklanders were a hair's breadth from having to boil their tap water due to a record rainstorm. Watercare, the council-owned company charged with providing safe drinking water and treating Auckland's wastewater, is working to strengthen its ability cope with more regular extreme weather.

After last week's violent storm when winds gusted up to 213km/h, bringing down trees and knocking out power to 182,000 people, many Aucklanders have said they weren't properly warned of the event. Impending weather events are being either over-hyped or completely missed, creating confusion for the public, a communications expert warns.