Sea and weather rule search for bodies
Police working to recover two bodies are ‘‘literally in the hands of the seas’’, as recovery operations scale back in the aftermath of the Whakaari/White Island eruption.
Police Deputy Commissioner Mike Clement spoke to media in Whakata¯ ne yesterday afternoon, describing how much it hurt his staff that they had not been able to return two people to their families. ‘‘It hurts us and it hurts our people,’’ he said.
The death toll of the eruption on Monday, December 9, has reached 16 with two remaining missing. Police on Tuesday named tour guide Hayden Marshall-Inman and 17-year-old Australian tourist Winona Langford as those missing.
Clement said police divers at one stage were ‘‘within metres’’ of recovering Marshall-Inman’s body when it was believed to have been sighted in the water near Whakaari’s jetty on December 11.
‘‘The reality was the conditions of the ocean meant they could not get close,’’ Clement said. ‘‘The people on that day have thought long and hard about that. They are disappointed.’’
Two days later, on December 13, they recovered six bodies from the island. Helicopter pilots who returned to the island just after the eruption told police Marshall-Inman’s body was near a stream.
However, when the Defence Force search team went back on Friday they could not locate him, despite walking up and down the stream three times. They also could not locate Langford, so it was concluded they had been washed out to sea by a weather event on the night of the eruption.
Clement said he spent an hour with the families impacted yesterday and stepped them through the rationale for the belief that both bodies were now at sea.
While the search had been difficult, ‘‘we haven’t given up’’.
‘‘We are here and will keep coming back until we are satisfied the opportunities [for recovery of the bodies] are gone. But we are literally in the hands of the sea . . . the reality is we cannot be precise. I think the family understands as time passes it means less chance but not no chance.’’
Senior Constable Bruce Adams, from the police dive squad, said conditions made diving difficult around the island with divers working with nearly no visibility and needing heavy protection from the acidic waters.
‘‘The acidity of the water means special equipment is needed to ensure the safety of the divers,’’ he said. ‘‘We need to minimise contact with the water, using full-face masks with positive pressure systems.’’
They are using hand sonar equipment to search sediment around the base of the island.
Divers also have to check through debris around rocks.
It is possible the two bodies could be swept into the Pacific Ocean and not reach land.