Whakaari nurse’s ‘endless kindness’
Married couple’s life together was just getting started when the adored nurse was killed in pre-Christmas crash. Ruby Nyika reports.
Rhys Bugden remembers waking to a car filling with smoke as bystanders tried to revive his adored wife Sheila Cheng.
Cheng, a hardworking nurse who spent her final week treating victims of the Whakaari/White Island tragedy, had already died at the scene of the crash.
Bugden, who suffered life-threatening stomach injuries in the crash, told Sunday Star-Times it was hard to comprehend she wouldn’t be returning to the home they’d made together.
The couple had been married almost five years, but lengthy immigration processes meant Cheng, from Taiwan, had been in New Zealand for only the past two.
‘‘It’s too short. You feel like you’re just getting started,’’ Bugden said.
Cheng, 51, who was working as an ICU nurse at Whakata¯ ne Hospital when the eruption happened on December 9, had spent long hours treating burns victims. Those close to her say she handled those traumatic shifts with aplomb.
On December 14, the couple were on an outing with friends when the crash occurred near Lake Rotoiti in the Bay of Plenty.
From the back seat of the car, Bugden and Cheng took the brunt of the impact.
Bugden is slowly recovering from his injuries, but the past five weeks have been a grief-filled blur.
‘‘Emotionally it’s day by day. Some days are better, some days are worse. It’s difficult.’’
But memories of that fateful crash near Lake Rotoiti on December 14 remain ‘‘vivid’’.
‘‘I just remember seeing this red SUV on our side of the road, coming straight towards us. Then [after] a couple of seconds, the impact.
‘‘Then I sort of woke up with smoke in the car, trying to get out of the car. I couldn’t open the door. I managed to get out the back. The car was filling with smoke so I didn’t want to hang around.’’
Despite sustaining critical injuries to his stomach, Bugden remembers a stranger performing CPR on his wife on the roadside.
‘‘They told me she didn’t make it. I remember sort of screaming.’’
A month on, it’s still hard for Bugden to talk about his wife, but he describes her as endlessly kind and bubbly.
She was loving and generous to friends, her patients and complete strangers.
‘‘If she could help someone in some way, she would. If there was something she could do then she’d do it.
‘‘She really went beyond herself to make people feel at ease.’’
When his mother, Pam Greenhalgh, was first told of the crash hospital staff had told her Bugden was fighting for his life.
Greenhalgh described the couple as ‘‘soulmates’’, who hadn’t had long enough together.
‘‘They were so much in love, they loved each other so much. It was just something beautiful.’’
‘‘They were so much in love, they loved each other so much. It was just something beautiful.’’ Rhys Bugden’s mum Pam Greenhalgh
Cheng’s funeral was postponed until January 4 so that Bugden – who was kept in Waikato Hospital for two weeks – could be there to say his goodbyes.
Bugden treasures memories of Cheng being awarded her PhD after a final presentation in Taiwan and visiting family she was close with there.
The couple spent a lot of the time going on walks together, gardening and sprucing up their home.
‘‘That’s another good memory, just building fences together. The hard thing is we sort of only just got things settled with her work and the house.’’ And it can be hard to shake the feeling that ‘‘she’s going to just come home.’’
The week after the crash, Bugden couldn’t stop replaying the moments before the crash in his head. The oncoming car churned through his mind ‘‘a few hundred times’’.
He’s still haunted by occasional flashbacks. ‘‘Sometimes they hit hard. You can’t stop thinking about them, one certain moment. That makes it a bit tough.’’
Bugden wanted to thank the community for the support he’d received and those who had donated towards a Givealittle page, which helped ease the financial burden while he recovered.
While Bugden understood no charges had been laid in relation to the crash, he wished more drivers would stick to the ‘‘basic rules’’ required to get a licence.
‘‘We sort of owe it to each other, just to look after one another.’’
On Thursday, two people missing after the Whakaari/White Island eruption were confirmed dead by the Chief Coroner, bringing the official death toll to 20.