School playgrounds disappear

The impacts of the cyclone have been felt far and wide around the region.

At Kaipara Flats School, Gabrielle wiped out a favourite playground called ‘The Huts’, a wooded area where the children played, building huts and communities.

Principal Debbie Hamer says it was a special place where students had their own economy, community rules and regulations.

“It was where their imaginations ran wild and they learned a lot about working and being together,” she says.

“During the cyclone, some of the trees in The Hut area were uprooted by the wind so we had to make the call for them to be felled.”

The loss of the playground comes close on the heels of the floods, which stripped the playground of the safety cushioning bark and flooded the field, which is now undergoing contamination testing.

“Our children are a hardy lot and we will make the best of what we have knowing that others have had it far worse. However, this is our story and we do feel sad.”