Pike River victim's father signs up to be part of re-entry mission
Wednesday, 29 August 2018
The father of a man killed in the Pike River Mine disaster is keen to be part of the mine re-entry efforts - and will give up his job to do it.
Rowdy Durbridge, whose son Daniel Herk died in the mine in November 2010, says he has applied to be part of the Pike River Recovery Agency's re-entry mission.
'I want to go in and find out what caused the explosion and I'd like to ultimately get my boy out and his other 28 work mates,' Durbridge said on Wednesday night.
Durbridge, 62, said he helped build the Pike River Mine. He was working a different shift to his son when the methane explosion happened.
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He also was part of the crew that sealed the mine before it was taken over by Solid Energy.
'I know it pretty well. I helped build it. I helped put in those doors we put them in as an air lock so we could get back in,' he said.
He was now working as a roading contractor but would be happy to give it up to join the re-entry team.
Durbridge has 17 years underground mining experience at Pike River, Solid Energy's Spring Creek mine and in Australia.
The recovery agency is advertising for five mining staff to help with re-entry and recovery work in the mine drift access tunnel.
Agency chief operating officer Dinghy Pattinson said a good deal of physical labour-intensive work would soon begin at the site.
'One of the first of these tasks coming up will be laying the nitrogen lines up in the bush,' Pattinson said.
The agency needed people with at least two-to-five years experience working in underground coal mines in New Zealand. The roles would initially be advertised on the West Coast as it was home to capable miners who would be interested in the work, he said.
The fixed term roles would end in June, 2019. Pay would will depend on experience and skills.
Russell Smith and Daniel Rockhouse were the only two men to escape the mine after it was rocked by the explosion.
On Wednesday, Smith said he could not give up his job at the Kokiri meatworks for a fixed term contract and that many former Pike workers would be in the same position.
'You've got to think of your future,' Smith, a former coal cutter at the West Coast mine, said.
'If you've got a good job you're not going to give that up for a few months and then back to scratch if you weren't lucky enough to get your old job back.'
Smith said he would like to go back in: 'I'm not frightened to go in there, it would be good as gold to go in but I couldn't throw in my job and then be left in the lurch when it's finished.'
Smith said he was 100 per cent behind the agency's efforts and that he believed there was a good chance it could find bodies in the previously unexplored section of the drift.
He hoped the recovery team would be able to continue into the workings beyond a rockfall and that new evidence would be found to lead police to lay charges against those in charge of the mine.
'I'm fearful most of the evidence will be the other side of the rockfall. But in reality they don't need new evidence, all the evidence is there.
'The Royal Commission was clear. In the weeks before the explosion, the managers got 21 warnings that methane had built up to explosive levels and they kept us down there. They were waiting for it to blow. It's a big cover up and the National Party helped by not allowing re-entry to happen sooner.'
Smith paid an emotional visit to the mine portal in July. On Thursday, Bernie Monk, whose son Michael died in the disaster, entered the mine for the first time.
The agency has hired a nitrogen plant, which was expected to be running at the site at the start of October. It would purge the mine of methane and stop fresh air at the end of the drift from entering the workings.
The agency is developing a detailed operational plan. Pike River Re-entry Minister Andrew Little signed-off concept plans in July.
Little will decide whether re-entry can happen after the detailed plans go through a thorough risk assessment.
The agency previously sought tenders from contractors and specialist suppliers to recover the drift. It received 14 expressions of interest but decided to manage the physical recovery itself.
Agency chief executive Dave Gawn said specific re-entry tasks may yet be subcontracted.
'This is a critical project and there are still a number of uncertainties.
'Until the re-entry and recovery plan is well advanced, the nature of the work, equipment required, and timeframes are not known. We have decided to manage the work ourselves because of those variables.'
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