Stories by Tracy Neal

A gig and a comedy show are just some of the ways the residents of Ward are coming together to support one another after the Kaikōura earthquake.

John Key has received the highest accolade in the Queen's Birthday honours list announced today.

A new Civil Aviation Authority app aims to test pilots' knowledge of the plane before take-off and avoid simple errors when flying, such as running out of fuel.

A Christchurch landscape architect is spearheading a fund-raising campaign to save a quake-damaged stone church near the Marlborough coastline.

A Nelson-based World War II pilot who cheated death on wartime raids over Europe now feels cheated out of a government-subsidised plaque for a headstone.

A group of sea cadets - boys and girls aged 13 to 18 - will sail from Nelson to Fiji on a 20m yacht to provide aid and collect plankton for international researchers.

First Person - After today's Fairfax and NZME merger rejection, Nelson Mail alumni Tracy Neal visits her old paper at a crucial time in its history. Video

The Nelson Marlborough DHB is set to begin its review in response to the case of a severely autistic 20-year-old murdered by her mother.

A Nelson couple have been sentenced after defrauding about $245,000 from the Ministry of Social Development over 15 years.

Seal populations displaced from a coastal sanctuary by the Kaikōura earthquake are recovering, the Department of Conservation says.

The American surgeon who caused a fatal crash near Nelson plans to set up a fund to support a surgeon exchange training programme between New Zealand and the United States. Audio

In the small village of St Arnaud, a once-quiet car repair and salvage business is suddenly a 24/7 operation since the road though the town became the main route south.

The Insurance Council is warning owners of earthquake-damaged homes in Marlborough that banks are cracking down on insurance pay-out spending.

Mapping the seafloor in Marlborough has thrown up some surprises, including that it has shifted since the Kaikōura earthquake, an information agency says.

Four months after their villa was wrecked, North Canterbury farmers Bob and Vicki Todhunter have made a stylish new temporary home in a shearing shed.

Marlborough residents left with badly damaged homes after November's earthquake are worried about a cold winter ahead with no heating.

A third generation farmer in Ward, who lost his home in last November's quake, has chosen to see it as an opportunity to change the way he lives and farms.

A GNS scientist says monitoring of land movement since 2004 shows the Kaikōura earthquake lowered the land by 20 millimetres.

The owner of a Nelson charter boat is astonished a sunken car belonging to a missing man wasn't found sooner, given the nearby wharf is popular place for fishing.

A vehicle resembling that in which Nelson teenager Leo Lipp-Neighbours was last seen seven years ago has been hauled from Nelson Harbour.

Special housing areas that side-step public consultation are causing disquiet among some Nelson city councillors.

Nelson's Christ Church Cathedral needs millions of dollars worth of seismic strengthening and the public may be asked to help raise the funds for the work

The stiff poses of Victorian folk etched in glass and stored in a Nelson archive have slowly made their way into the digital era.

Time and tide are rapidly changing one of the coastal city's most valued natural assets. Video

The chance of another large earthquake within the next month has dropped to 18 percent, GeoNet says.