Well, it has been 20 years since the flooding had been impacted in the lower North Island of New Zealand way back in 2004 when weather systems sweep over the country, mainly from the west as the strongest February westerlies in over 60 years blew across the lower North Island between the events of the 14th to the 17th of February. Roads were blocked by slips and fallen trees, hundreds of people were left homeless, farmland was covered by silt and water, rivers breached their banks, stock drowned & bridges were damaged meanwhile the cost of the devastation exceeded NZ$100 million as a storm brought high winds, heavy rain, flooding and slips to much for the North Island as well as the upper South Island. The lower North Island was severely affected, with 100-year floods in Manawatu-Wanganui and 50-year floods in Wellington causing millions of dollars of damage. Thousands of people were evacuated. Two people drowned in the sea at Wellington and one person was presumed drowned in the Marlborough Sounds. Trees felled on houses caused injuries to a girl in Wellington and a woman in Auckland. A person was also injured therefore causing felled power lines started a house fire, but the lower North Island floods from 2004 is relatively compared to the earthquake in the Bay of Plenty region in 1987, the Wahine maritime disaster in 1968, Cyclone Bola in 1988 (Which took place a year after the BOP earthquakes in '87 & both the Auckland anniversary floods & the most devastating of them all which impacted the entire Hawke's Bay region, Cyclone Gabrielle from last year).
And onto the royal related news such as His Majesty the King of King Charles III (Who took over from the late Her Majesty the Queen of Queen Elizabeth II since 2022 (The year that she passed away where they had a state funeral there in London) has announced that he has been diagonsed with skin cancer (Which is melanoma just like the late John Britten (The famous New Zealand motorcycle engineer) who passed away in 1995) which an aggressive form of the disease which shocked the entire royal family (Just like Her Royal Highness Princess Catherine had health issues recently in which she suffered an mystery illness which kept her out from the public eye) with him now having to undergo treatment, but I'm really not sure whether he'll abidicate the throne & hand it to His Royal Highness Prince William (Who is second in line if King Charles III passes away as Pops told me on the 11th of February this year), we'll see.
And in the motor racing related stuff such as the 7 time world champion of Sir Lewis Hamilton (The guy who raced with & against both Fernando Alonso & Jenson Button & raced against the likes of Schumacher & current 3 time world champion Max Verstappen) making a shock move to Ferrari next year, therefore he announced 2024 will be his last season with the Silver Arrows of Mercedes-AMG, the team that he raced since 2013 in which he replaced Michael Schumacher (The year that he had his skiing crash later in the year who raced against the likes of the late great Ayrton Senna, Nigel Mansell, Jacques Villeneuve, Hakkinen, Alonso, Hamilton & Button), & has won 6 world driver's titles between him as he becomes the first British driver to race for Ferrari since Northern Irishman Eddie Irvine in 1999 where Irvine almost became the world champion which had gone in the way of Mika Hakkinen (Who raced with & against the late Senna & Mansell & raced against Schumacher, Villeneuve, Alonso & Button) in the McLaren in the aftermath of Schumacher who hurt his leg during the British Grand Prix after an accident at Stowe corner as a result of brake failure which ruled him out until the Malaysian Grand Prix, ending his championship bid, but Hamilton's decision to switch to Ferrari is very similar to David Beckham moving to Real Madrid in 2003 from Manchester United as well as Australian NRL league stars Latrell Mitchell who converted from being a Rooster into a Rabbitoh & Cooper Cronk who left the Melbourne Storm to join the Sydney Roosters to accomodate his marriage with Australian TV presenter Tara Rushton (Although Cameron Smith didn't attend Cronk & Rushton's wedding because he wasn't on the guest list), then there is some more perfect prime examples including Brad Thorn who headed to union with the Crusaders from league in which he played for the Brisbane Broncos, then Sonny Bill Williams who had to depart rugby league with the Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs to head into union with RC Toulonnais, while female tennis sensation Jelena Dokic had to change her allegiance from Australia to Yugoslavia (Then it was Serbia & Montenegro before becoming Serbia as of today) before switching back to Australia when she made a comeback in 2008, then Ellyse Perry who made an announcement that she was going to become a cricketer after originally becoming a footballer/soccer player while Luis Figo was heading to 'El Clasico' club rivals Real Madrid from FC Barcelona, then the late great Ayrton Senna who publicly announced that he was going to Williams from McLaren in 1994 in which the Williams FW16 became uncompetitive due to a crack down on driver aids such as active suspension, traction control, launch control & fully automatic gearboxes in which the rival Benetton team took advantage of it (For which I thought it was an illegal car, but according to the comment from Max's dad Jos Verstappen who thought that the 1994 Benetton was so much difficult to drive as a result of the driving aids ban being enforced by the FIA, in which Benetton had their most valuable championship points being taken away for cheating which resulted in Williams claiming the constructors championship while Damon Hill was the victim of dangerous driving caused by foul play during the title decider in Australia when Michael Schumacher deliberately ran into Hill by damaging his car's suspension, ending the Brits quest of World Championship glory by handing Schumacher his first World Championship in a very controversial way in which was the year marred by tragedy at Imola in 1994 with Senna getting killed during the race 2 days after the Austrian competitor of Roland Ratzenberger who lost his life in a serious wreck during Friday qualifying) before something tragic happened that it revealed that there was a mechanical failure to Senna's Williams car that caused the fatal crash in one of F1's tragic weekends in Imola, Italy (And it has been 30 years since the tragic events unfolded at the Emilia Romagna region over there where arguably one of by far, Formula One's greatest ever drivers who unfortunately lost his life in a serious accident with the Brazilian was then since gone, but not forgotten, with chicanes being introduced at the Imola circuit in order for speeds to cut down the following year) at the San Marino Grand Prix which still haunts them was to blame while both Ian Chappell & Tony Greig were making their way to World Series Cricket founded by the late Kerry Packer from test cricket during the 70's period, then Tom Brady who moved from the New England Patriots to play for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in which he won one Vince Lombardi Trophy with them in 2021 to go with the 6 that he had with New England while LeBron James who made a surprise announcement billed as 'The Decision' that he was leaving the Cleveland Cavaliers (Who he had one championship with in 2016 along with the Los Angeles Lakers in a COVID-19 impacted 2020) to go to Miami, Florida to join with the Miami Heat in which he won both NBA titles with in 2011-12 & 2012-13, then Jarryd Hayne who was leaving rugby league with the Parramatta Eels NRL side to play in the NFL for the San Francisco 49ers for 8 games before he returned to the NRL in which he had a brief stint playing rugby sevens for Fiji while the late great Brazilian football icon of Pele who left his homeland with his club Santos to join the New York Cosmos which was a bombshell move that put US soccer on the map, then the late great Australian touring car legend of the late great Peter Brock (Who was the poster boy for Holden who won a record 9 times at the great race with the brand & is a 3 time champion of the Australian Touring Car Championship (Just like Craig Lowndes, Scott McLaughlin & Shane van Gisbergen) announced that he left Holden in 1987 to join BMW in 1988 then Ford in 1989, 2 years before he returned to Holden but after the initial split he never won the Bathurst 1000 again, while Mat Rogers, Wendell 'The Big Dell' Sailor & Lote Tuqiri were stars of the NRL until the trio all jumped ship to rugby in which they were crucial cogs in Australia's run to the famous 2003 Rugby World Cup final, then the man known as 'Lowndesy' was Holden's favourite son in the 90's in the aftermath of the late Brock's success throughout the 70's & 80's as the apparent heir to the throne gave up his Formula 1 dream and turned his attention to touring cars where he won three straight titles with Holden, then, after four years with the Red Lion, he made the shock move to join Gibson Motorsport and Ford, but it proved to be a massive failure and Lowndes never won the championship again as well as Scott McLaughlin's high profile move from Supercars to IndyCar shook world motorsport. Never had a V8 tin top racer made the move to open-wheelers with zero wings and slicks single-seater experience. It came off the back of a tumultuous few years for the three-time Supercars champion, who was part of the parity scandal that rocked the sport (With massive record fines & point deductions towards the championship being handed out (But they kept their win with ex-A1GP & DTM ace Alexandre 'Alex' Premat at the great race in 2019 but the record pole winning time didn't count) following their triumph in which McLaughlin clinched the championship at Sandown prior to the season finale in Newcastle, but chose not to celebrate in wake of Paritygate). McLaughlin has since enjoyed success in his career change, scoring a podium in just his fourth race and winning in the second season & Marc Marquez making the shock switch from Honda to Ducati. In terms of motorcycle racing dynasties, the bond between Honda and Marc Marquez was one that would seemingly never end. Over seven years, the Spaniard won six titles with the Japanese manufacturer. However, an accident in the 2020 Spanish Grand Prix marked the beginning of the end. Injuries kept him sidelined that season and continued to plague him in the years after. Although he would win more races with Honda, by last year he felt the bike was uncompetitive and had to move on. Following back-to-back winless seasons, Marquez ended his 11-year relationship with Honda and joined Ducati.
And finally in rugby related news that this years Super Rugby Pacific ad is their best work where players like Crusaders player Will Jordan (Who is ruled out of the entire tournament through a shoulder injury), one of the Brumbies players of Allan 'Big Al' Ala'alatoa (Who is currently injured at the moment), Force player Issak Fines-Leleiwasa alongside a pair of Blues players like Mark Telea & Caleb Clarke for example had to play rugby thinking it was either underwater rugby or water polo, but I thought that the 2006 Super 14 ad was by far the G.O.A.T. (Greatest of all-time) of Super Rugby adverts compared to this years one because not only it was filmed in Ukraine but one of the Waratahs players at the time of Mat 'The Rat' Rogers didn't appear in the ad (In which Ma'a 'Skux' Nonu (Hurricanes), Joe 'The Rocket Man' Rokocoko (Blues), Rico Gear (Crusaders), Nick 'Snapper' Evans (Highlanders) & Nathan 'Sharpey' Sharpe (Western Force) would gone on to appear in that advert) was in fact that he got injured during a Wallabies test against Wales in Cardiff so a Ukrainian extra had to fill in for him by wearing a Waratahs jersey while there was a Rugby World Cup related story about before last year's tournament started that the regining champions South Africa revealed that they brought on 21 survivors (+ both Handre Pollard & Lukhanyo Am joined midway through the tournament after Malcolm Marx & Makazole Mapimpi succumbed to injuries during the RWC) from the winning campaign in 2019 according to the previous blogs that I did last year such as captain Siya Kolisi, Faf de Klerk, Pieter-Steph du Toit (Standout player of the game against New Zealand in the final), Duane Vermeulen (Who retired after the tournament at the tender age of 37 but Schalk Brits still holds the record as the oldest Rugby World Cup winning player at 38 when he broke the all-time record in 2019 set by Mosgiel native of All Black Brad Thorn in 2011), Eben Etzebeth (Who sported a hairdo inspired by one of his Springbok teammates of RG Snyman following another success for the Springboks at the World Cup when they arrived home once again with the famous William Webb Ellis Cup) & others, compared to 2015 where the defending champions at the time of the All Blacks had sent in 14 survivors from the success that we had in 2011 such as captain Richie McCaw, Dan Carter, Kieran Read, Nonu, Conrad Smith & others, but there is the New Zealand women's rugby team who was once known as the Gal Blacks before we settled by adapting our current name to the Black Ferns way back in 1998 in which the original team name thought that it was involuntary due to its links with sexism according to either Carole or Pops telling me during our dinner that we had at Rutland on the 10th of March, unlike the Australian women's football/soccer team who originally going to be the female Socceroos before subsquently changed it to the Matildas after Waltzing Matilda also way back in 1995.
So that is my 537th blog of the year 2024 (MMXXIV) & my 13th of this year, viva Ukraine & Palestine.
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