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We live in one of the most beautiful and bountiful regions of Aotearoa New Zealand – but our hills, rivers, plains, and coastline also make Hawke’s Bay prone to flooding.
Knowing how best to live alongside our rivers and our coastline is really important, especially during extreme weather. As we experienced in Cyclone Gabrielle, river, surface and coastal flooding can happen at the same time, and the impacts can be devasting on people, property and places. The Regional Council plays a key role in helping communities feel safer and be more resilient to flooding and extreme weather events.
Explore the sections below to understand the types of flooding affecting Hawke’s Bay, the actions we’ve taken following recent reviews, and the future plans we’re discussing with our community.
Read: these documents outline the size and scale of the challenge to reduce flood risk in Hawke’s Bay.
Watch: learn about the critical flood resilience work underway in Hawke's Bay and how your input can help guide our path forward. It’s a longer watch, but with such a complex issue, we think it’s time well spent. Go full-screen and settle in.
Many parts of our region sit on floodplains or below sea level, and inland we’re surrounded by erodible hill country. Coastal areas face added risk from storm surges and rising seas.
With climate change, more intense and frequent weather events mean the protection we’ve relied on in the past won’t be enough for the future.
When we talk about flood risk we mean rivers flooding, heavy rain overwhelming stormwater systems and storm surges on the coast. Click through below to see how we manage each type of flooding.
River flooding, or fluvial flooding, occurs when a river or stream overflows its banks and floods normally dry land.
Most of our major rivers – Mohaka, Esk, Ngaururoro, Tūtaekurī, Tukituki, Maraetotara and Pōrangahau in Hawke’s Bay have catchments in the foothills of the Ruahine, Kaweka and Kaimanawa Ranges. Flood flows usually happen during rainfall with an easterly or north easterly component. These rivers respond rapidly to rainfall. It may only take a few hours for this kind of flooding to reach populated areas of the region, including Wairoa, the Heretaunga plains and townships like Waipawa, Waipukurau and Pōrangahau in the south.
One of the most effective ways to reduce the risk of river flooding is by managing what grows near our waterways. Invasive freshwater pests like willows and aquatic weeds can choke rivers, block flow, and increase flood risk. Similarly, planting the wrong species along riverbanks can weaken natural flood defenses.
That’s why we focus on:
Find out how we protect river health across Hawke’s Bay.
Surface flooding, or pluvial flooding, occurs when the rate of rainfall exceeds the rate at which water can soak into the soil, or when the soil becomes saturated and excess water runs off.
Surface flooding doesn’t originate from rivers, but it will worsen the effects of river flooding in major rainfall events. High river levels can also make surface flooding worse by preventing water from draining away.
Surface flooding can occur almost anywhere and often happens quickly. Water collects in low areas, historic flood flow channels, or where obstacles like raised roads, hedges, or irrigation features prevent water from moving down gradient.
Surface flooding in urban areas is often referred to as stormwater flooding. Stormwater flooding occurs when the increased runoff from sealed surfaces like roads and driveways is greater than the capacity of stormwater systems, or if they are not working properly because of blockages or pump failures.
Infrastructure assets we help manage (in conjunction with other councils) for surface flooding:
Coastal, or seawater flooding, happens when a combination of high tides, strong onshore winds, and elevated swells drive the sea up and over the natural beach crest or coastal stopbank.
Parts of our coastline are vulnerable to coastal flooding. It can threaten coastal communities, endanger stock, and cause long-term damage to productive land. Vulnerable locations include low-lying areas such as Bay View – susceptible to flooding, especially during storm surges and high rainfall events, Ahuriri estuary and Westshore, vulnerable to tidal flooding and storm surges, Haumoana and Te Awanga, prone to storm surges, erosion and flooding and Clifton, affected by coastal erosion and storm-related flooding.
Infrastructure assets we manage for coastal flooding:
Both regional and local councils have responsibilities related to natural hazards and climate change adaptation. Councils, mana whenua, and communities are working together on the Clifton to Tangoio Coastal Hazards Strategy 2120. This is the most populated stretch of coastline in Hawke's Bay, and the first part of our coastline where we are looking to put a long-term strategy in place.
Stopbanks are specially designed and maintained mounds of earth that help to limit or prevent the spread of floodwater onto surrounding land. Stopbanks usually include grass cover, smooth surfaces, a consistent height and no bare soil, holes or ruts.
Most stopbanks in Hawke’s Bay are owned and maintained by us. These stopbanks may be on private or public land. Some individual landowners may have constructed their own stopbanks or other flood protection measures, however, these do not guarantee protection for wider areas of land.
Stopbanks are found beside rivers and streams that are at risk of flooding nearby land during heavy or prolonged rainfall.
While some stopbanks are put to the test regularly, others only prove their true value over time, sometimes up to 50 years or more.
Stopbanks are an effective way to prevent small to moderate flood flows from breaking out but they are only built to a certain design capacity.
Historically, our reliance on stopbanks has encouraged a higher level of development on floodplains than what might have occurred had the structural protection not been put in place.
So although stopbanks might reduce the frequency of flooding in the short-term, in the long-term they may actually increase the flood hazard posed to many communities.
Stopbanks also rely on the stability of adjacent berms and a clear fairway to perform as designed.
With climate change increasing the number and frequency of severe weather events, maintaining and improving flood infrastructure is becoming increasingly expensive and complex and the design capacity of stopbanks will continue to be pushed to their limit.
Pump stations are crucial for managing drainage in their catchments; low-lying areas where water collects from the higher areas above them. These catchments have large flat areas with limited natural drainage outlets and, while drain networks have been built to support pastoral farming and prevent water from ponding, pump stations help move water from the drainage system back to the river.
The Council is currently carrying out a substantial upgrade programme at three pumpstations in the Heretaunga Plains – Awatoto, Brookfield, and Pākōwhai – to increase their performance and resilience.
The Council manages a network of drainage systems across the region to help reduce the impacts and duration of flooding and surface water ponding.
Some areas in Hawke’s Bay are flat, with poor draining soils, making them prone to flooding from surface water and increased groundwater levels, especially during and after heavy rainfall. The drainage systems are a network of waterways and connected assets like culverts, pump stations and flood gates, that help surface water flow away.
We are responsible for the maintenance of these drainage schemes, which ensures good channel capacity and efficient land drainage. Maintenance includes weed control, the prevention of bank and bed erosion, the removal of blockages from trees or sediment, and the upkeep of culverts and flood gates.
Each year, we remove weeds using spraying or mechanical removal.
Please note, not all drains are part of a Council managed drainage scheme.
We need good access to carry out maintenance on these drains. Trees, hedges and other vegetation must not prevent access or the ability of people or machinery to enter the drain to carry out this work.
To prevent damage to services like pipes or wires across drains, we encourage landowners to install markers to highlight where these need to be avoided.
1% AEP (often called a "1-in-100-year flood") has a 1% chance of happening in any given year.
It's worth noting that the occurrence of a rare flood does not reduce the chances of another rare flood within a short time period. The probability of occurrence is the same every year.
This data is shared in real-time with Civil Defence Emergency Management to support informed decisions, issue warnings, and coordinate responses.
You can apply for Land Information Memorandum (LIM) from your local city or district council. A LIM is a report prepared by the city or district council at your request providing information relating to special land features or characteristics, including potential flooding, erosion and various other natural hazards. A LIM report can also include a wide range of other information about the property held by the council. Understanding of, and information on, natural hazards can change over time. A LIM report is a ‘snapshot’ in time of the information known by the council at that time. The city or district council may impose a charge or processing fee when requesting a property LIM report from it.
On 1 July 2025, new national regulations will come into force that requires the Regional Council to provide information it holds about natural hazards (including flooding) to the city and district councils. In turn, the city and district councils will be obliged to include that information in LIM reports.
The Regional Council already regularly shares new information about flood hazard mapping with the relevant city and district councils, plus various other agencies like the HBCDEM Group and key infrastructure providers.
Central Hawke’s Bay District Council webpage
The Regional Council administers 27 flood resilience and drainage schemes throughout the region to reduce risk of flood and erosion damage. The Council maintains networks of stopbanks, hydraulic structures and pump stations and manages the river, stream, and drainage channels to ensure they work as expected during periods of high rainfall and flooding to help reduce the impact on land and property. This includes gravel management to maintain flood capacity in our major rivers, and allocation of gravel from riverbeds.
The flood resilience and drainage schemes are grouped into two major schemes: the Heretaunga Plains Flood Control Scheme (HPFCS), the Upper Tukituki Flood Control Scheme (UTTFCS), and a third group of much smaller schemes located across the region. The majority of the network of stopbanks is designed to offer a one in one-hundred-year level of service, while the network of managed drains across the region are designed to protect productive land from flooding during high rainfall and offer a lower level of service, closer to one in five years level of service.
About 84% of Hawke’s Bay’s population lives and works in areas that benefit from these flood schemes, particularly in urban and highly productive rural areas.
These schemes reduce flood risk for communities such as Napier, Hastings, and surrounding settlements, as well as agricultural and horticultural land across the Heretaunga and Ruataniwha Plains.
While HBRC’s flood schemes cover a significant portion of the population, some communities remain outside these areas.
Since Cyclone Gabrielle, we’ve taken a staged approach to building flood resilience. We began with recovery – repairing damage, replacing what was lost, and reducing immediate risks. Next, we’re reviewing and strengthening existing flood schemes to ensure they’re fit for purpose. Alongside this, we’re continuing long-term projects like the Coastal Hazards Strategy, working with other councils to respond to coastal risks, and supporting community flood resilience initiatives across the region.
Where we're at now: we're working with our communities, including mana whenua, to decide what additional resilience is needed, and what we can collectively afford. Some options cost more now.; some choices mean more risk later. Find out more about our Reimagining project
In July 2023, an independent review was commissioned to investigate the circumstances and contributing factors that led to the flooding in Hawke’s Bay during Cyclone Gabrielle in February 2023. We received the Hawke’s Bay Independent Flood Review report in July 2024, and we’ve been working hard to turn the recommendations into real changes that make our region more resilient to future climate events.
There are 47 recommendations within the report, which focused on several key areas:
Alongside the recommendations of the Review of the management of the Wairoa River bar, it's clear we can make better use of local knowledge in the development and implementation of flood-risk solutions.
Six initial priority projects were approved by HBRC in December 2024 to deliver outcomes to meet the recommendations from the review.
We created an online hub to help our communities prepare for and deal with severe weather, whether it’s flooding or extremely dry conditions. In the flood section, you’ll find regularly updated webcam images of local river mouths, and rainfall and river data maps. In the extreme dry section, you’ll find our dry weather app that supports our farming community to understand weather and soil moisture conditions. View the Extreme Weather Hub. (We're working on making the hub easier to use, thanks to feedback from the community).
We’re reviewing our two major flood schemes – Heretaunga Plains and Upper Tukituki – to explore how we can better reduce flood risks. As well as reducing flood risk, this is about keeping costs manageable, and working together with communities and mana whenua. A group of community representatives is being set up to help shape the options, with work continuing through to March 2026. Find out more about the Reimagining Flood Resilience project.
We're developing a flood forecasting dashboard so people can check potential risks to their communities ahead of a storm. This will be added to the Extreme Weather Hub once ready.
Evacuation trigger levels are being developed and tested as part of joint work by Hawke’s Bay Civil Defence, local councils, and our team – helping determine when communities should evacuate in a flood. In early 2026, Civil Defence will work through these trigger levels with communities to finalise plans. Two pilot communities are already helping shape the approach.
We're reviewing the Hawke's Bay Hazard Portal to ensure it remains a reliable tool for the future. It supports both the public and councils with easy access to property and area-specific hazard information and is administered by HBRC.
We're developing a new bylaw to better protect flood infrastructure. This bylaw will help prevent damage to stopbanks and other critical flood protection assets. It will give the Regional Council clearer powers to manage and safeguard the infrastructure our communities rely on. We’re already engaging with landowners and stakeholders, with public consultation planned for April 2026.
+64 6 835 9200
159 Dalton Street. Napier 4110
Private Bag 6006, Napier 4142
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