Golden Bay community aids new dad
Nick Schryvers considered mountain biking over the Takaka Hill road when he heard his partner might be going into labour in Nelson with their first child.
Schryvers got the call in Golden Bay on Wednesday, a day after the region was cut off when the road was blocked by slips brought down by the remnants of tropical cyclone Gita.
He was working in Collingwood for the company HealthPost, when his partner Bec, who was due to give birth yesterday and had moved to Nelson to be near the hospital, realised things were starting to happen.
‘‘There was one flight that was leaving within an hour ... I tried to book online and it said I was too heavy.
‘‘I thought you know, I can bike over the hill and then get picked up over there, and then at least I’m with the family,’’ said the 28-yearold, unaware at the time of the extent of the damage to the road.
Luckily he didn’t have to entertain the idea for too long before the general manager of HealthPost indicated help might be at hand. ‘‘She said maybe, just maybe there’s a helicopter coming through, and maybe we are putting parcels on it, and maybe we can put you on too.’’
Schryvers had only worked at the company, which supplies health supplements, for five months.
Unable to deliver its parcels as usual by road, local freight company Sollys and New Zealand Post arranged a helicopter on Wednesday to help dispatch the company’s orders.
‘‘Thankfully I’d just packed a bag, and then within 10 minutes of packing the bag the chopper had landed, and I didn’t even know if I was getting on in at that stage. And then just before they took off they said ‘yep, we’ve got room, jump in’.
Within five hours of landing, the couple were in hospital. ‘‘It was about as perfect timing as it could be,’’ Schryvers said.
Their baby boy, Artie, arrived in perfect health on Thursday, weighing in at 7.8 pounds.
‘‘I’m just so overwhelmed at how delicious he is,’’ said Bec who grew up in Collingwood.
‘‘It’s quite overwhelming that people would work as hard as that for you, that they would do something as kind as that. It’s such a nice community.’’
‘‘I didn’t even have time to process it I think until I was in hospital that night,’’ Schryvers said.
‘‘I thought ‘Oh my gosh, I would have missed this, I would have been on my bike in a mudslide.’’
He had since had time to reflect on his mountain bike plans. ‘‘It was crazy to see all the devastation from the air. We flew over Riwaka and the road and then I definitely re-thought biking at that point.’’
Bec had been watching media reports of the storm damage in Tasman district from Nelson. ‘‘I knew he’d get here,’’ she said.
They were so grateful to all involved in making that happen, the couple reiterated. ‘‘It was such a community spirit, everybody was out waving goodbye and good luck. It does make you appreciate those people and that community, it’s amazing,’’ Schryvers said.