There are growing concerns mounting piles of silt across Hawke's Bay and Gisborne are putting people's health at risk.
Large amounts of the flood waste can be seen surrounding damaged properties and roads.
"It's the hygiene issue, the smell and what have we got, maybe nearly a metre of silt that's come up through the river," Gisborne resident Llewellyn Williams said.
As water levels have receded, the sludge has started to dry.
The city's water restrictions have made the clean-up effort much more difficult.
"With the water shortage at the moment, it's a bit hard to blast all of it out but we've got tanks running. But without the water blaster it's pretty much an uphill battle," Jae Carpet Cleaning's Corey Boocock said.
It's estimated hundreds of thousands of cubic metres need to be removed from Gisborne's residential areas.
However, the silt is beginning to try, leading to concerns about the health risks involved.
"We've been getting word that there's gastro going around, and that's because the sediment's being inhaled," resident Ariki Brightwell said.
Gisborne chief incident controller Nedine Thatcher Swan said the dried silt "is hazardous".
"We're really encourage people to wear masks, wear gloves, wear PPE when working with the material. We just don't know what's in there."
Two silt disposal sites will be opening for residents tomorrow.
Thatcher Swan said preparing the sites to hold the silt "so we're not having to double handle them" meant it took "a little bit longer than we'd like".
University of Canterbury geotechnical and earthquake engineering professor Misko Cubrinovski said the mountains of silt in some hard-hit areas are worse than what was seen after the Christchurch earthquakes.
"After the Christchurch earthquakes, there were approximately 500,000 tonnes of silt and fine sand ejected at the ground surface due to liquefaction," he said.
"There were approximately two months required to clean up the majority of the silt. The worst-affected areas are far worse than what we saw here in Christchurch in terms of volumes."
Some in Gisborne say there's so much silt, moving it is almost impossible.
"We are going to need bigger machines for the back," Brightwell said.
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