'One chance' at recovering human remains in Pike River drift, says Minister

Friday, 7 August 2020

“So there’s a possibility, even if only a very small one, that there might be some human remains there,” Andrew Little said on Friday.

Human remains may be found in the Pike River mine access tunnel at the end of the month, says Pike River Recovery Minister Andrew Little.

The team working on the recovery are expected to reach an area known as Pit Bottom in Stone by the end of August and it was possible that anyone who survived the first explosion may have taken refuge in that location.

Labour MP Andrew Little pictured during his visit to Nelson.

Pike River survivor Russell Smith and Pike River family members Sonya Rockhouse and Anna Osborne talk about an important milestone in the drift (mine access tunnel) recovery. (Video first published in August 2020)

“So there's a possibility, even if only a very small one, that there might be some human remains there,” Little said on Friday in Nelson, a day after visiting the West Coast site of the 2010 disaster that killed 29 men.

“But that will be the only chance that we have to recover human remains, because getting through the rockfall into the mine workings … would be just a huge, technically challenging, difficult undertaking that we’re just not contemplating it.”

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Russell Smith with his loader from the explosion inside the Pike River mine.

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Little’s comments come a few days after the loader used by survivor Russell Smith was towed out of the access tunnel, known as the drift.

Anna Osborne, whose husband Milton was killed in the mine, said she hoped the mine workings and all of the bodies would be recovered.

The journey down the Pike River mine drift.

“Hopefully we will find at least some human remains and give closure to a few families, but also it’s a game changer if they do find human remains because we are not sure if there are more miners just around the corner,” she said.

“They’ve said that’s it, there is no more money, they don’t have an open cheque book. But, I think, if bodies are found that may change things, so I’m keeping my fingers crossed.”

Little said the recovery team was moving a section of the 2.3km-long drift that no-one had been in since Smith and fellow survivor Daniel Rockhouse walked out on the day of the first explosion.

Covering about 20m to 40m a day, the team was about 500m from Pit Bottom in Stone, which Little described as a “little network of tunnels” that contained instrumentation panels and drive gear.

“That’s where we want to get to, because that will give us a better idea about what happened,” he said.

“The job of doing a forensic examination of Pit Bottom in Stone, that’s going to take a wee while. That’s where the police really want to make sure that it is done very carefully.”

About 30 hours was spent on the loader “photographing it, testing various things before they pulled it out and then the police spent another day on Wednesday doing their forensic examination on it. So everything is being done very, very carefully.”

The drift was being treated as a crime scene and each stage was being photographed and examined closely.

Pike River Recovery Agency staff open and walk through doors at the 170m seal. (Video first published December 17, 2019)

“Anything that looks a bit unusual or suspicious, if it’s removable, it’s bagged up,” Little said

Infrastructure, such as conveyor belt machinery, was also being pulled out. About 200m before the rockfall area, a “special door” would be installed and that final stretch would be examined by people wearing breathing apparatus.

One of the objectives of the recovery was to see if there was enough evidence to mount a prosecution.

“I think, it is appalling that no-one has been held to account properly for this when we know that this was a totally preventable tragedy,” Little said.

“We know there was corporate management failure, we know that the health and safety regulator at the time – the Department of Labour – didn’t do its job. It let the families and New Zealand down but no-one has been properly held to account in a court of law for what happened.

“There was the buy-off of [mine boss] Peter Whittle’s prosecution, that still sticks in the families’ craw, so if there is good evidence that means we can hold someone to account, then it’s a good reason to do this.”

The other reason was to try to gain a better understanding of what happened.

Families of the men who died had been closely involved with the recovery project from the outset, Little said.

The Pike River Recovery Agency was set up in January 2018 to re-enter the drift.