Taieri residents were on alert late last night as the Taieri River hovered near its second flood warning alert level at 10pm, but Otago Regional Council staff said they had no serious concerns and expected the river level would start dropping during the night.
Waitaki District Council civil defence public information manager Rowan Carroll said normally the 33mm of rain that fell between 11pm on Monday and 6.45pm yesterday, would not cause concern, but, saturated ground from last month's deluge struggled to cope.
Ms Carroll cautioned motorists to take extreme caution in the area.
A detour was in place last night after State Highway 1 was closed between Pukeuri and Hildethorpe, north of Oamaru, about 8pm, when several cars became stuck in floodwaters across the highway.
About 20 other roads around the Waitaki district were closed by flooding by 5pm, many of them having only recently reopened after the last heavy rainfall.
Civil Defence was monitoring the rapidly rising rivers.
Other roads carried warnings about flooding, including SH1 north of Oamaru.
The Waitaki District Council again faced shutting rural water schemes it had only managed to get operating again by the middle of last week after discoloured water and silt entered pumps.
The Kakanui River, which peaked at more than 900cumecs two weeks ago, had dropped to 10cumecs, but shot up to 130cumecs by 5pm.
Most river levels began dropping at 8pm.
By 4pm, Oamaru Airport had recorded 37mm of rain in the previous 24 hours, Clifton falls in the Kakanui valley 33mm and the Dasher 37mm, with the rain starting to ease.
Rivers in the area started dropping about 8pm.
In Dunedin, 31mm of rain was recorded at Pine Hill in the 24 hours to 4pm yesterday, when the rain started to ease.
Just under 45mm was recorded over the same period at Riccarton Rd in Mosgiel.
The rain caused surface flooding and some road closures in the city, on Otago Peninsula and on the Taieri Plain.
The Taieri River, the Silver Stream and the Nenthorn Stream reached their first flood warning alert levels by mid-afternoon.
