Coastguard to get nice new home
Taranaki’s coastguard volunteers are to get a new $100,000 building to speed up their response times and give them a place to have a hot shower.
Coastguard Taranaki president Lee Drummond said a new building would be built next to Surf Life Saving headquarters at Breakwater Bay in Port Taranaki.
While their radio service is already there, their equipment is at a different location at the port.
‘‘This new home will house equipment much closer to us and give our guys a place to warm up when they get back in,’’ Drummond said.
‘‘This will be our home; it will give us a single location.’’
Drummond announced the news of the shed on Sunday, at the annual coastguard award ceremony.
Drummond said the $100,000 building would would include warm showers and hangers for wetsuits and he hoped it could be completed by May 2017.
Most Coastguard volunteers have spent the last week helping in the search for Matt Smith, 18, who has been missing since a boat he was in capsized off the coast of New Plymouth.
‘‘They’ve only just got in and we wanted to take the time to thank them for their dedicated service,’’ Drummond said.
Though they were upset about the missing man, it was a way to spread awareness on safety education.
‘‘It’s time like these that we have to piggy back off of and push the importance of safety education.’’
Drummond said Kiwis tended to make risky decisions and he hoped there could be something learnt from such situations.
‘‘Everything is online and there’s such an ease of access.‘‘
He said in the summer, volunteers passed out pamphlets on safe boating.
‘‘Too many people think they don’t need a course, but anything can happen out there.’’
Coastguard has about 40 volunteers who dedicate about 10,000 hours a year.