A tiny school on the Napier-Taupo Road is closed due to weather, but its Principal is more concerned about her students' welfare than their lessons right now.

Rangitaiki School, which is about half an hour along State Highway 5 from Taupo, is without power after Saturday's snowstorm.

Sole-charge Principal Andrea Haycock wouldn't be able to get to class even the school if was open - she lives in Taupo and State Highway 5 is closed and won't reopen until at least later on Monday morning. 

"It's really thick," she said of the snow. "I was talking to my Board Chair who is on Taharua Road and he'd had half a metre of snow there, which is a lot of snow isn't it?"

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Ms Haycock told Newstalk ZB people are 'in crisis', without power and cellphone coverage, and due to the roads being a mess nobody has been able to reach them with generators yet. She had heard some farms have also lost a lot of animals.

"It's pretty hard going. I've been able to get hold of a few of [my students] and they've said 'oh the cow shed blew away' and it's like 'the cow shed blew away? That's huge."

Andrea Haycock hates to think of the damage the storm has done to the school.

"We've got sunshades that will probably be wrecked and a brand new tunnel house that's probably gone. You've got to assess all that when you get there, but nobody can actually get there."

However her immediate concern was for her students.

"There's a few families out there, grandparents looking after grandchildren and things like that, that I am worried about, because I can't get hold of them and I don't know how much food they've got. And I do worry about that ... country people are tough though, and they're very resourceful."

Electricity company Unison has told her it could be a week before power is fully restored in Rangitaiki.

Ms Haycock said it was more important to get power back on at homes before the school, and at local pubs so people have somewhere to meet.

"Houses are a priority. Kids can stay home from school. So we'll just have to wait and see and play it by ear. And I'll wait to hear all their fantastic stories when they get back to school."