Lighting up the new year
Emergency services gear up for a rowdy night under clear skies
As Kiwis around the country gingerly rouse themselves with splitting headaches and hazy memories of last night’s revelry, emergency services are winding down after their busiest night of the year.
New Zealanders saw in 2019 in mostly fine weather, packing bars and restaurants and turning out in their tens of thousands to music festivals and fireworks displays.
Emergency calls were estimated to triple last night, with St John Ambulance injecting 105 more frontline staff and 80 extra response vehicles.
A third of those 111 calls are traditionally alcohol-related, with the peak of 10pm to 2am tipped to trigger about 500 callouts.
An early New Year headache for St John came about 4pm yesterday, with the discovery of drugs made with pesticides and paints at Gisborne’s Rhythm & Vines festival.
At 9.30pm St John’s Victoria Hawkins said everywhere around New Zealand was “stable” — but this was the calm before the storm.
“It’s not really until 11pm that things start heating up,” Hawkins said.
Auckland’s fireworks proved a star drawcard for families and visitors to the city as a constant stream of people wandered the Wynyard Quarter waterfront.
With the city skyline as a backdrop and the sound of grooving Latino tunes from the bars, partygoers drank in groups at footpath tables, while children whooshed past on scooters followed by their parents.
We’re here for the fireworks and to see what is on. So far it’s been pretty chill.
Anastasia Ermakova, 16, and her dad were among those enjoying the atmosphere. She said they had driven up from Hamilton for the night.
“We’re here for the fireworks and to see what is on,” Ermakova said. “So far it’s been pretty chill.” Alan Kenyon was settling into the Wondergarden music festival at the city’s Silo Park — particularly enjoying Kiwi band Cut Off Your Hands.
“This band reminds me of my youth, a backdrop to a lot of seminal moments,” he said.
St John Auckland acting district operations manager John Armitt hoped the overcast weather last night might subdue wild behaviour.
“At these events, if it’s a [fine] night people get a bit more adventurous, but if it’s a wet night that sometimes slows people down.”
The Auckland District Health Board expected 350 patients at emergency departments over the 24-hour New Year period.
In Auckland, the big events all had emergency services presence including Highlife music event at Northcote Wharf, So Hotel NYE rooftop party on Customs St, Wondergarden festival at Silo Park, and AMU creative art festival at South Head.
SkyCity casino’s Federal St party from 8pm was also a focus, with its midnight fireworks from the tower.
The country’s biggest New Year’s music festival, Rhythm & Vines, was also an emergency hotspot with 21,000 festival-goers there last night.
St John’s head paramedic at the festival, Shane Clapperton, said his team had treated more than 700 people by the start of yesterday — some from drug overdoses.
Four people were taken to hospital after falls. About 50 people an hour were being seen by St John as of 9pm.
It was also a horror day on New Zealand’s roads yesterday, with one person killed and nine hospitalised after five separate crashes.
Police and the NZ Transport Agency reminded motorists not to stop on the Auckland Harbour Bridge to watch the midnight fireworks, threatening fines up to $600.
Elsewhere, Tauranga turned on a mild and overcast evening.
Not so long ago a traditional spot for New Year’s Eve revelry and drunken public disorder, in recent years it has been relatively quiet.
Tauranga City Council’s familyfriendly events were on the CBD waterfront, in Papamoa and, for the first time, fireworks in Matua.
Much further south, in the Cardrona Valley, 10,000 young music lovers enjoyed a perfect summer night at the Rhythm & Alps festival.
Early rain in Dunedin cleared for an evening of music, dancing and a five-minute New Year fireworks display in the city’s Octagon.
As many as 15,000 people were expected to see in the New Year in Queenstown.
Anastasia Ermakova of Hamilton in Auckland for New Year’s Eve