Whakaari/White Island: Pilot rushes to help but couldn't save friend

Tuesday, 10 December 2019

When helicopter pilot Tom Storey heard White Island was active, he 'booted it down there' to try and save his mate.

Storey was building a house in Whakatane on Monday when a pilot called him to say the volcano was 'pretty active'.

'I just dropped the old tools and booted it down here,' he told The Project on Tuesday.

He arrived on the island and recognised his friend, Hayden Marshall-Inman, who was 'in a pretty bad way'.

**READ MORE:

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* Whakaari/White Island eruption: Tourists visited volcano days before disaster

* Whakaari/White Island: 47 on island when it erupted, five confirmed dead, eight missing**

'I just pulled him out from where he was and made him as comfortable as I could,' Storey said.

He wanted to go back, but was instructed not to. 

'It's pretty hard to take, you want a bit of closure for your families and yourself,' he said.

'You never want to start a job and not finish it, so hopefully fingers crossed we can get out there as soon as we can and recover him and the rest.'

Being on the island was like 'running through talcum powder', he said.

'Just a very white dust, hard to breathe, actually extremely hard to breathe – without a gas mask you were gasping for air.'

Adrenaline took over and 'you just do what you do', he said.

'I'd rather break a few rules and save some lives, rather than sit here wondering what we could've done.'

But there was no luck bringing back Marshall-Inman.

'You wish you could've done more to get him back sooner … our deepest condolences to the families.

'I just did what I could do to make him as comfortable as he could be and made sure we could get him out of there as soon as possible.'