Source: Radio New Zealand
Queues in the car park at PAK’nSAVE Wairau Road. RNZ / Pretoria Gordon
Queues have been forming at supermarkets in Auckland, as people prepare to hunker down for Cyclone Vaianu.
The storm is expected to hit the North Island on Saturday.
The car park at PAK’nSAVE Wairau in the North Shore suburb of Glenfield was full, with dozens of cars circling around.
A community post reported people were lining up 10 deep at the checkouts. Trolleys appeared to be full of bottled water and toilet paper.
Stephanie Gallardo goes to PAK’nSAVE Wairau Road every Saturday.
“Whether there’s a cyclone or not, we will go to PAK’nSAVE around this time of day,” she said.
Stephanie Gallardo [left] at PAK’nSAVE Wairau Road was not too worried about Cyclone Vaianu. RNZ / Pretoria Gordon
Gallardo told RNZ it was the busiest she had ever seen the supermarket be.
“Most of them are panic buying, really,” she said.
Gallardo was not too worried about Cyclone Vaianu, especially as she was originally from the Philippines.
Vladimir and Zoya were disappointed to find a lot of what they wanted to buy was already sold out when they arrived at 9am on Saturday.
Vladimir (right) and Zoya (left). RNZ / Pretoria Gordon
“The price is so high, and there’s not really anything in the market. We can’t find some products. It’s already sold out. So many people – maybe before the cyclone [comes] in – the people just worrying about the food and everything,” Zoya told RNZ.
The couple said they had done their usual shop, “because we always have some food in the pantry [just in] case”.
Jess Clark said PAK’nSAVE Wairau Road was her usual supermarket, and she had done her usual shop too – except for bottled water.
Jess Clark. RNZ / Pretoria Gordon
“But that’s because our water’s actually been gross in Beach Haven already, so we just thought we’d get some just in case.”
Clark said the car park was “crazy” but inside the supermarket was “not too bad”.
“They’ve got every single checkout open.”
Amid. RNZ / Pretoria Gordon
While Amid said the queue to enter the supermarket was not as bad as the one for fuel.
“It’s less worse than that. It was easy,” he said.
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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand
