1995: Cave Creek disaster
‘‘A father mourning his son bore a weathered log on his shoulder up the long, rocky track at Punakaiki’s place of death yesterday,’’ reporter Mike Crean wrote in The Press on May 1, 1995.
‘He sobbed deeply as he trod, and his eyes streamed. The log was his Cross; Cave Creek his Calvary.
‘‘A Maori party lifted the tapu from the death site. A helicopter lifted the broken platform in sections from the bottom of the chasm. Then an eerie stillness descended on the scene, barely disturbed by grieving families of the 14 disaster victims.
‘‘This is a special place,’’ says Department of Conservation [DOC] spokesman Steve Attwood. It is well known for its aura. It is like a cathedral. Visitors often are reduced to whispering in its confines.
‘‘Not surprisingly, for in the huge hush of this hole in the ground even the trickle of water down the sides is echoed and magnified.’’
Attwood said: ‘‘The area is riddled with caverns. It is full of holes and chasms.’’
Thirteen of the 14 victims were students from Tai Poutini Polytechnic in Greymouth. The 14th was a DOC officer. A poorly constructed viewing platform collapsed on April 28 and fell 40 metres.
‘‘The decking flipped and dropped, as from the top of a three-storey building, on to the rocks below,’’ Crean wrote. ‘‘There it lay, bloodstained and battered, until it, like the remnants at the top, was taken away yesterday.’’
160 Years is a series marking the launch of The Press newspaper in Christchurch on May 25, 1861.