this is bloody serious.

A hashtag that might help.

When Cyclone Gabrielle promised to sweep across the north island of Aotearoa, the weather experts said brace for something bad. How could anyone know just how bad it would be?

As the grim reality of what the cyclone has done to so many of our neighbours becomes truly realised, it’s hard to articulate the enormity of it all. The loss of life is utterly distressing. The damage to vast swathes of fertile, productive land will be widely felt for a long time to come with recovery possibly years away.

The heartbreak was palpable as stoic farm folk broke down in tears on the tele as generations of farming history was destroyed overnight. Heritage apple trees ripped from their roots and sent off in a torrent of water so powerful it threw cars about and lifted houses from their foundations. The homes gone in a time when housing is already in a crisis state leaves you shaking your head wondering how on earth we’ll solve this and help get these people cared for and back to any sense of normality.

The grape vines, covered in nets to prepare for an imminent harvest, now tangled and rotting covered by a newly formed ground of fine but choking silt that threatens to turn to lung-damaging dust as this shambles dries out.

Jesus. It’s an apocalypse.

The stories of community coming together are incredible but they’re sobering. When you try to comprehend what is being asked of these small towns and the people left stranded in them is beyond words. Can you imagine the fatigue? Insane.

It makes you feel very redundant when you can’t help directly. Many of us would want nothing more than to jump in our cars, loaded with supplies and shovels and head to the areas where volunteers are needed but it’s possible we’d just get in the way. So how do we help and how do we put our guilt of not being affected into positive assistance that can help result in a quicker recovery for all? Donate? Definitely. Buy wine? You bet.

Buying wine is a sound option but some of the wineries will still be working out whether they even have stock to sell and a lot of the stock that did survive will be water damaged and potentially unfit for sale. Computers and processes to even think about sending a bottle of wine out may also be impossible to sort right now.

The day after this disaster I wanted to jump into action and get us all buying booze from every place that was under water. After checking in on Dave Mackintosh of Kenzie Wines to make sure he was ok, he offered the sober, steady advice of just cool your jets for now. He quite rightly commented that people on the ground are still reeling and don’t know up from down right now. He was right. I took a step back. Firstly, we needed to let those regions know we’re heartbroken for them and that we’re with them and ready when they need us. We needed to give them space to adjust to what has happened, grapple with that and then, as they begin to recover, they’ll reach out — and so they are.

On a recent instagram post I saw that Phil Barber, Petane owner and winemaker, replied to a comment that they should be ready to send out orders of the stock they managed to dig out, hose off and save in about a week’s time.

You’ve probably seen Phil on the news. Esk Valley based Petane Wines have been massively affected. They have shared some extremely moving moments with the nation as they located family members and surveyed the damage to their homes and farms and businesses. So, having some wine to sell so they can put some cash in the bank is bloody important. Give them a follow @petane_wines and stand by for when they’re ready to sell and ship. Be ready to pay full price for water damaged stock. This is how we show our love and support for these communities.

Phil’s comment on that post made me think about how we learn who has stock to sell. It’s hard to get this information unless you’re following each and every winery. Social media can be a total dick sometimes but this is a moment where we can use it for good.

This may not lead to much — or maybe it will help. We’d like to propose that we start a hashtag that we follow that alerts us to wineries able to sell (and ship at some point in time).

Northland, Gisborne and Hawkes Bay wineries — if you can, please consider using the hashtag #gabriellerecoverywine on a social media post when you’re ready to process orders. It feels like a glib hashtag, I know. The wine you have to sell isn’t recovery wine, it’s the beautiful, precious stuff you’ve laboured over and crafted from the land you love. It’s been years in the making. However, no one else is using that hashtag and we need to make sure the road to market is a clear one…even if it’s only figuratively on bloody Instagram.

Dear readers, if you know of wineries located in affected regions who are able to process orders — even if they can’t physically ship and deliver for a while — please share this article with them. A simple hashtag could help us navigate our way back to these amazing, all important wineries.

Photograph by Phil Barber shows some of the Petane wine bottles recovered from the silt with devastated vines in the background.