Some in the media learned the lessons of Cyclone Gabrielle and the Auckland Anniversary Weekend floods, just as the emergency management authorities have done - and they made a concerted effort to take this week's weather warnings seriously. Others, not so much.

Some in the media learned the lessons of Cyclone Gabrielle and the Auckland Anniversary Weekend floods, just as the emergency management authorities have done - and they made a concerted effort to take this week's weather warnings seriously. Others, not so much.

As a storm struck on Tuesday, Newstalk ZB host Simon Barnett opened the phone lines for callers to deliver on-the-ground weather updates from around the country.

Among them was a truck driver who gave him an eye-witness update on the road conditions in Waikato, along with a colourful description of the driving conditions.

"The weather down here's shocking. It's starting to flood. It's diabolical," the caller said.

"Some of them guys are driving to the conditions. And there's some guys driving like idiots, as per usual."

Barnett's news you could use approach stood in contrast with how some hosts from his network handled the last weather disaster to strike the country - Cyclone Gabrielle.

Back then, Newstalk's breakfast host Mike Hosking and his wife, early morning presenter Kate Hawkesby, pooh- poohed what they saw as overblown weather warnings.

"What we've done is whip ourselves into this extraordinary frenzy," Hosking said.

"We panic," Hawkesby replied.

"We're almost in a state now where we want to be told what to do all the time, and we almost enjoy it where it's like 'hunker down, don't go to school, don't go to work'."

They were joined in their jeering by Newstalk's mid-morning host Kerre Woodham, who bemoaned the timidity of Auckland schools that decided to close for the day.

"What message does this send to our children? Yet again their education must be sacrificed for the greater good, be it Covid, be it floods, be it cyclones - there are greater priorities than education," she said.

It turned out Cyclone Gabrielle was a big deal. It killed 11 people, cut off whole towns, and damaged and wrecked hundreds of homes.

Newstalk received formal complaints about its hosts minimising the unfolding disaster, even as the station billed itself as an official source of news updates and Civil Defence information. …

Go to this episode on rnz.co.nz for more details