And that's where we'll be leaving things this evening.

Here's a recap of the day's events:

• Several people remain missing after a landslide hit the Beachside Holiday Park at the foot of Mount Maunganui in New Zealand's North Island
• The slide came after record-breaking rain and storms in the region
• Authorities are yet to determine how many people remain trapped under the rubble. A rescue operation involving specialist teams and sniffer dogs remains ongoing
• A separate landslide took out a home in nearby Welcome Bay, killing two people
• New Zealand Prime Minister Christopher Luxon is expected to visit both impacted sites tomorrow
• There is no indication so far that any Australians were caught up in either landslide

You can look back at the blog to see how the day unfolded. Don't forget to also download the ABC News app and sign up to our range of mobile alerts to stay in the know.

Thanks for joining us.

The police minister declined to give details on whether foreign nationals were caught up in the Mauao landslide, saying authorities were still "working hard" to determine that.

"I'm not going to go into details on that because it is so sensitive," he said.

"There were some people that left the campsite that no one knew had left. So we're still tracking people down, checking CCTV footage. 

"There's still people to be notified, so the focus is on getting that work done and providing the support to the families."

The ABC contacted DFAT earlier today for confirmation on any Australian casualties and was told "urgent enquiries" were being made in that regard.

Mark Mitchell says two bodies were recovered from a separate landslide at Welcome Bay, not far from Mauao.

Police had said at a press conference earlier that two people were able to escape, but another two remained missing.

That incident had hit and taken out a home.

New Zealand's police, emergency and recovery minister Mark Mitchell has just spoken to ABC News Channel from Auckland.

He says there's still no update on the number of people missing in the Mount Maunganui landslide, with continually shifting earth on site hindering search efforts.

"The teams are working as hard as they can to try and recover people from the slide … but it's a difficult and challenging site, because we could face further slides there," Mitchell said.

He said authorities were using every tool at their disposal, including sniffer dogs, to pinpoint where people were buried. No one has been retrieved so far.

New Zealand media outlet Stuff is reporting at least six people are believed to be missing after the landslide at Beachside Holiday Park in Mount Maunganui.

Authorities are yet to provide any official figures on the number of people missing or feared dead, as rescue operations continue at the campsite and in nearby Welcome Bay, where two people are believed to be missing after a separate landslip.

New Zealand's prime minister, Christopher Luxon, will be visiting the North Island regions hit by this week's weather bomb on Friday.

RNZ reported arrangements were being made for his travels to East Cape and Bay of Plenty.

Luxon has said his government is doing "everything we can to support those impacted".

Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell told Radio New Zealand authorities had a "rough idea" of the number of people impacted by the Mauao landslide, without elaborating.

Mitchell will be speaking to ABC News Channle in an hour so we should expect to hear more on this then.

He said the rescue operation would continue into the night if required.

The landslide at the foot of Mount Maunganui today followed record-breaking rains in New Zealand's North Island, with a spell of severe weather befalling five regions.

While landslides are common across the country, experts say they are being charged by more frequent storms, courtesy of an increasingly warming planet that has more moisture in the air.

"We have that much more flooding 'fuel' in the atmosphere that significant floods come much more readily now," James Renwick, climate science professor at the Victoria University of Wellington, told the Science Media Centre.

"To stop such events becoming worse, to stop them overwhelming our abilities to adapt, we must stop adding carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to the air.

"Our governments and business leaders must find ways to decarbonise the economy as soon as physically possible — and help other countries do the same."

Hiker Mark Tangney saw people fleeing the landslide-hit campsite in Mauao and ran to help, the New Zealand Herald reported.

"I could just hear people screaming, so I just parked up and ran to help," he told the paper.

"I was one of the first there. There were six or eight other guys there on the roof of the toilet block with tools just trying to take the roof off because we could hear people screaming: 'Help us, help us, get us out of here'."

Later the voices stopped, he said.

New Zealand's Fire and Emergency commander William Pike told reporters earlier today that people at the camp had instantly tried to dig into the rubble and heard voices.

"Our initial fire crew arrived and were able to hear the same," he said.

But rescuers soon withdrew everyone from the site because of the risk of dangerous earth movements, Pike said.

Asked if voices had been heard since then, he said: "Not that I know of, no."

Reporting with AFP

It's been over seven hours since the first landslide hit in Mauao, at the base of Mount Maunganui, in New Zealand's North Island, but there's still a lot we don't know, including how many people were trapped, their identities and details of any potential fatalities. 

If you're just tuning in, you can get yourself up to speed with this handy explainer my colleague Max Walden from the Asia Pacific Newsroom has put together.