After a week of wild weather, a convoy of car enthusiasts, and an influx of visitors for the Alexandra Blossom Festival, local police were pleased to have a weekend with very few offences, Acting Sergeant Graham Perkins says.

“Blossom Festival for us, police-wise, was a success,” he said.

In what has long been a regular part of the festival weekend, a convoy of classic cars made its way from Gore, but the police had no problems with them, Graham said.

“Around about 120 vehicles were met at Raes Junction by our traffic unit and shadowed through. When they stopped, we stopped, and we made sure all were roadworthy.”

A small number of those stops resulted in cases that have led to teasing of police officers and a few red faces from those involved, in which passengers in left hand drive vehicles were breath-tested by police.

None of the local police were involved, Graham said, but the error was understandable all things considered.

“We set up in the middle of the road for officer safety and often the focus is on other things than the steering wheel, who else is in the car, what is happening in the back seat.”

With more than 300 vehicles stopped for breath-testing on Friday alone, police got into a rhythm and were not necessarily expecting left hand drive cars, he said.

They see the humour in the situation themselves, and will learn a lesson from the incidents.

Graham suspected that the weather leading up to Saturday had some effect on festival numbers, with not everybody who might have planned to attend doing so. 

“The earlier rain hit Cromwell quite badly, but we came out of it well”, he said.

The speedway event was cancelled but the burnouts went ahead, he said, which inspired many amateur attempts on public roads, as could be seen by rubber left on the road in many places.

“There were burnout tyre marks up through Twizel.”

High winds last week also damaged political hoardings, but vandalism of them continues, he said.

“Once again, leave the signs alone.”

The police had only one arrest on Saturday night, for an alcohol-related incident, and although those involved had been at the festival, it was not considered to be related. A further summons was served on Tuesday in regard to the incident. 

As for staffing matters, Graham said that interviews had been held for the rural sergeant’s position, for which three local officers had applied. The successful applicant would be notified shortly, and there might be a resulting vacancy locally, he said.

All in all, in what is always a busy week, local police were very happy with having a relatively quiet time.