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Disaster and hazard mapping for iwi

Last reviewed: 23 August 2026

Start with people, place and capability​

Emergency mapping for iwi and hapū should not begin with a national hazard layer and a list of critical assets. Start with the people, places, relationships and local capability that need to remain connected through an event.

Useful questions include:

  • Where are whānau, kaumātua and others likely to need support?
  • Which marae, kāinga and local hubs can provide shelter, kai, communication or coordination?
  • What routes actually work in bad weather, not just on the road network?
  • Where are water, fuel, generators, medical support and other practical resources?
  • What whenua, urupā, wāhi or taonga may need protection during response and recovery?
  • What local knowledge about flooding, slips, coastlines or access is not visible in agency data?
  • What information is too sensitive to place on a broadly shared response map?

GIS can then connect that local picture with hazard models, infrastructure and agency information.

Manaakitanga and privacy​

A response system may contain information about vulnerable whānau, health needs, access problems and private locations. That information can be essential during an emergency and harmful if it spreads afterwards.

Separate public safety information, operational response information, whānau-level information requiring tight access and culturally sensitive locations that may need protection but not disclosure.

Do not publish a household vulnerability map because it makes the dashboard more complete.

Marae are more than facility points​

A standard emergency GIS may classify a marae as a building or community facility. That misses much of its practical role.

Depending on local arrangements, marae can be places of whānau connection, manaakitanga and shelter, food preparation and distribution, information sharing, local leadership and coordination, and cultural continuity during displacement and recovery.

Map the capabilities relevant to the kaupapa, not simply the point location.

Build the local picture first​

A useful base package can include marae, kāinga and agreed response hubs, roads, bridges and known local access routes, water supplies, generators, fuel and communications where appropriate, rivers, catchments and coast, topography and elevation, safe assembly or high-ground areas and local knowledge of recurring flood, slip or isolation points.

Then add the relevant external hazard layers.

Flooding​

Council flood models, LiDAR and river data can support planning, but they should be read alongside local experience of what floods first, where water actually travels and which routes become unusable.

Useful external data can include:

Useful outputs include safe routes and high-ground areas, marae and response-hub exposure, bridge and road isolation points and private whānau support information held separately.

A modelled flood extent is not a memory of the last flood and a memory is not a hydraulic model. Use each for what it can contribute.

Earthquakes​

GeoNet and Earth Sciences New Zealand provide national earthquake information and shaking products.

Useful local maps may combine shaking information with marae and response hubs, bridges and access routes, water and communications, landslide or road-closure information and places requiring priority checks.

Keep personal details out of general response maps.

Tsunami​

Use official evacuation zones where available, but make sure the local map also makes sense to people on foot and reflects real access.

Useful products include evacuation-zone maps with familiar local reference points, walking routes to safe ground, printed A3 or A4 maps for places where power or internet may fail and locally agreed assembly points.

National guidance: https://www.civildefence.govt.nz/assets/Uploads/documents/publications/guidelines/directors-guidelines/08/16-tsunami-evacuation-zones/dgl-08-16-Tsunami-Evacuation-Zones.pdf

Coastal change and sea-level exposure​

Coastal hazard layers and elevation data can help with long-term resilience for kāinga, access, urupā, infrastructure and other places.

Useful sources include council coastal-hazard layers, LINZ coastal elevation, historic imagery and national coastal-flood information.

Use the map to support choices and kōrero over time. Avoid turning a single scenario line into a declaration that a place has no future.

Check every hazard layer​

A hazard layer needs more provenance than a source organisation name.

Record:

  • provider
  • hazard type
  • model or dataset name
  • version or publication date
  • scenario or return period where relevant
  • modelling method at a useful plain-language level
  • spatial resolution or scale
  • stated limitations
  • whether it represents observed, modelled, forecast or scenario information
  • the date you checked the provider source

Do not combine different scenarios into one map without keeping those distinctions visible.

A council flood model may be the relevant technical source for a planning question. Local experience may be the strongest evidence about which road becomes unusable first. Neither should silently replace the other.

See Provenance and source checking.

Agency structures are an interface​

Emergency agencies use standard impact categories and common operating pictures. Shared terminology can make coordination easier during a response.

That does not mean an iwi or hapū system should organise all of its knowledge around agency categories.

Keep a local structure that makes sense to the people doing the mahi, then map or translate the information required for coordination with Civil Defence, Fire and Emergency, councils or other agencies.

Useful agency resources include:

Two useful map products​

A planning map can be detailed and controlled, including infrastructure, access, resources, hazard layers and locally authorised information.

A response map should be simpler: what is happening, what is closed, where people can go, what routes are usable and where support is available.

Avoid flooding the response map with every layer held in the planning system.

Try it now​

Choose one marae or local response hub you know.

  1. Create a small QGIS project containing the marae or response hub, roads, waterways and elevation or terrain context.
  2. Add one current public hazard layer relevant to that place.
  3. Record the provider, publication date, scenario and limitations before analysing it.
  4. Add two locally known access or isolation points in a separate internal layer.
  5. Create a simple A4 response map that answers only three questions: where is the hub, what route may fail, and where is the safer alternative or assembly area?
  6. Remove anything that identifies individual whānau or sensitive locations from the broadly shareable version.
  7. Export a PDF and check whether it remains understandable without an internet connection.

The useful output is not the map with the most layers. It is the map someone can understand and use during an event.

Explore in Matawhenua​

Use the Matawhenua 2D and 3D viewer for initial orientation around terrain, settlements and local geography. Where a hazard decision depends on a model or statutory layer, return to the original provider dataset and metadata rather than treating the viewer as the source of record.

Offline capability​

Assume internet, power or cloud services may fail.

Keep an offline package with the minimum layers needed to orient and operate locally. Print maps can still be useful.

At least two people should know how to access and update the package.

After the event​

Recovery mapping should not focus only on damaged buildings and infrastructure.

Depending on the kaupapa, map whānau displacement and return where it can be done safely, access restoration, marae and local service capability, damage to whenua, awa and coast, effects on urupā and other significant places, restoration priorities and changes that should alter future preparedness.

Record local observations while memories are fresh, with appropriate authority over anything sensitive.

A practical starter structure​

A local project might use:

  • 01_base_layers
  • 02_hazard_layers
  • 03_local_response_capability
  • 04_restricted_whanau_support
  • 05_planning_outputs
  • 06_response_outputs
  • 07_metadata_and_sources
  • 08_event_archive

Keep access rules and the reason for each restricted layer in a short readme.

Final check​

A strong iwi or hapū emergency map should help people care for one another and stay connected to place.

If the map is excellent at reproducing the agency common operating picture but cannot tell local people which marae has water, which road really closes first, where kaumātua may need help or what places matter in recovery, it is not yet the local system people need.

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