Dianne Hope-Ede and her partner Paul had a terrifying experience in their motorhome parked at a property under some tall trees on Old Waipu Rd.

The lightning, wind and thunder woke Hope-Ede at 2am, followed by a period when it all stopped, she said.

“Ooh, I thought it was over, but if I had been knowledgeable about tornadoes I would have realised that was the eye of it, and the rain and wind whipped up again really, really aggressively.”

Hope-Ede told her partner “this is not right” and the pair got out of bed and headed for the door when they felt the motorhome shaking like an earthquake and a terrible roar.

“When it stopped shaking we went out and could see limbs of the tree had harpooned the back end of the motorhome where we had been sleeping, like pick-up-sticks skewered from the top of the roof into where it would have killed Paul on his side of the bed,” she said.

Another tree limb crashed through the side of the motorhome.

The outside of the motorhome was covered with fallen trees, including a large uprooted tree with a 50cm to 60cm diameter trunk, about 7m from the motorhome.

“If that had fallen in a different direction it would have killed us instantly. We were lucky, very lucky,” she said.

Hope-Ede said her partner was a panel beater and made some repairs to allow the couple to drive carefully home to Northcote on Auckland’s North Shore.

“I just hope I don’t dream about it tonight. I want to put it behind me…it was absolutely terrifying,” she said.

Kaipara Civil Defence Emergency Management controller John Burt said the township was dealing with extensive damage as a result of the twister that touched down around 3am yesterday.

He said trees and power lines had been toppled in the storm, causing extensive damage in the Mangawhai village area.

He urged people to stay safe, stay home, and remain well away from contractors working to restore power and clear damage.

Daylight revealed the fury and destructive force of the early-morning tornado, with a number of homes on Old Waipu Rd left gutted and exposed to the elements.

Kaipara Mayor Craig Jepson said Mangawhai was “full” during the storm – its permanent population of 6000 residents nearly doubled to about 10,000 for the long weekend.

“It might take them a couple of days to get the Mangawhai village back up. That tells you that the damage is pretty extensive,” said Jepson, who lives in Mangawhai.

Moir St, the main street in the Mangawhai village, is closed as power crews work to restore the power lines. Debris is strewn over the road and fences are down.

Emergency response teams are currently surveying the extent of the damage, using drones to assess the full impact across the township.

Northland MP Grant McCallum said this afternoon there were now only small parts of the township without power. These streets had sustained the worst of the impact and were “heavily damaged”.

He said Northpower expected everyone’s electricity to be restored by midnight.

There is a cordon in place around the Mangawhai village area, where the tornado has caused the most damage. Police are being kept busy controlling residents and visitors.

A Civil Defence update said a number of active hazards remained in the village areas, including exposed power lines and fallen trees.

People inside the cordon are being advised to stay in place and not walk or cycle in the areas, and to treat all power lines as live.

“If you do not live in the affected areas, please do not enter the cordon. We need space for the emergency services to do their job and secure the area,” the Civil Defence alert said.

Emergency Management Minister Simeon Brown said he had been briefed on the storm.

“My heart goes out to those affected, including those seriously injured,” he said.

The storm also struck Waipu and Ruakākā, though Mangawhai appeared to be the worst-hit area.

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