62-year volunteer retires

The longest-serving volunteer firefighter in the country has hung up his helmet after 62 years in the service.

Marlborough’s Raynor Henson, 86, joined the fire service in his early 20s, when he was kitted out with a woollen uniform and an old policestyle hat.

Five uniform changes and a some grey hairs later, Henson has decided it’s time to walk away.

‘‘You’ve got to give up sooner or later, so it’s best to be carrying somebody off the hill than be [the person] carried off the hill,’’ Henson said.

Henson, aka ‘‘Rhubarb’’, said he would miss the camaraderie at the Picton station.

The ‘‘Rhubarb’’ moniker was given to him in his early days by Jim Topp, who later became Picton’s officer.

‘‘The Picton Fire Brigade is like a big family really. It’s been like that right since I joined.’’

He said a lot of the younger volunteers would ask him for advice because of his wealth of experience.

‘‘A lot of the younger ones would get little tips off you ... but most of them know more than what we ever learnt,’’ Henson said.

A lot had changed over his time in the service.

Most of the callouts in his early days were for scrub fires, however the role became about responding to accidents and medical emergencies too, he said.

Several callouts had stuck with him, including a fire at Carey’s Boatyard in 1982 which was the ‘‘biggest and costliest’’ fire he had chief fire witnessed during his career.

Henson got the call about 2am to go to the job and said the boatyard was ‘‘well alight’’ by the time they got there.

‘‘The whole yard was burnt down but we were lucky to save two boats on the slip either side,’’ Henson said.

Throughout his years, being on-call meant he missed a lot of family events. Henson said he couldn’t have done his dash in the service without his family’s support.

While he decided now was the right time to walk away, he wouldn’t be completely disconnected from the service. His daughter Lindy volunteered at the brigade to help with administration work.

Picton chief fire officer Wayne Wytenburg said Henson was a ‘‘real character’’ who would be missed by everyone.