Help The Baker Whanau Rebuild Their Papakainga

The Baker whanau crisis-Rachael Baker(our friends Mum and family) lives in Te Kohanga in Port Waikato, with her children- Molly, Sefo and grandchildren Rehaan and Abby.This awesome whanau moved to Port Waikato to escape crushing housing costs and make a better life for themselves have now been made homeless by flooding.The whanau had bought two shipping containers and were busy converting them into houses. These were run off solar power and a backup generator.The family was doing its best to be self-reliant. Racheals brother, Thomas, owns the land but the whanau was working to create Papakainga, a form of communal housing.

On April 7, floodwaters from weeks of heavy rain spilled across their paddock. The family were woken at 5am to "ankle-deep water and a river flowing outside their front door.

Floodwaters rose rapidly, flooding their cars and home.Racheal and her daughter Molly, 22, dragged the children from their beds, grabbed their dogs and waded through waist-high water to safety.The children - Baker's son Iosefo, 11, and Molly's children Rehaan, 5 and Abby, 1, are now "traumatised".

A neighbour's septic tank overflowed and sent sewage into the water, ruining clothes,all electrical equipment, mattresses and couches. A camera full of photos of the kids is among the ruined belongings.

The floods were made worse because culverts in the nearby Whauwhautahi Stream were blocked, damming the water so it spilled into their property.

The water' has since receded but it's left mud, topsoil and sewerage throughout the home. And it's all through the container house.

Rachel Baker and her family, who have been forced to live in cars after the flooding left their container home uninhabitable.

Baker's daughter Molly moved from Whangarei with her children to help her mother and be close to her whenua. The humble paddock had been "full of life" before the floods, she said.The floods were "heartbreaking" after all their work, she said.

Everything was very awesome, it was good, but because of this we're having to start from scratch."

The kids are traumatised and are acting up, and she wants to provide them with stability but they now have nowhere to live.