Burns victim flown to Middlemore

A local man who suffered burns to both arms while changing gas bottles at Motukaka (Paradise) Bay, near Taupo Bay, on Sunday evening was flown by Auckland’s Westpac rescue helicopter to the city’s Middlemore Hospital.

Mangonui Fire Brigade CFO Ant Pedersen said the man was changing the bottle on a cooker when the accident, initially reported as a bottle explosion, occurred.

Gas in the line from the bottle to the cooker had been ignited by a pilot light on a small fridge, he said, resulting in first degree burns to both the man’s arms.

“It sounds more serious than it was — at least it wasn’t a bottle explosion — but it was bad enough,” Mr Pedersen said.

A short time earlier the Mangonui brigade was called to Puwheke Beach, on the Karikari Peninsula, where a 59-year-old man, also believed to be local, had fallen and dislocated a hip. The Auckland rescue helicopter was called but was diverted to Motukaka Bay, the fire crew carrying the injured man around the rocks “and through the water a bit.”. He was subsequently admitted to Kaitaia Hospital.