Five years ago, the Icepak refrigerated stores exploded, killing firefighter Derek Lovell, injuring seven others, and scarring the Tamahere community. Described as one of the worst industrial accidents in the country’s history, it happened on a night when the community was together, during a fundraiser at a local school.
Not enough has changed, says Philippa Stevenson, a Tamahere resident and journalist. Industrial safety legislation remains inadequate and communities remain at risk of similar disasters in the future.
Philippa watched the tragedy unfold, covered it for national newspapers, and attended court hearings and investigations. She wrote this story for the Tamahere Forum, a subsidiary of the Number 8 Network community website.
TAMAHERE’S Model Country School’s annual pumpkin patch party, held a week ago, was a real treat.
Families who came to the annual fundraiser at the Waikato school were amazed by the giant pumpkins and the creativity of the children (and undoubtedly the parents) who created amazing works of art from the various vegetables.
The children rode horses and small four-wheelers, jumped and slid on bouncy castles, and everyone ate pumpkin soup, pumpkin cookies, hamburgers and sausages – all paid for with pumpkin money.
It’s a good community that supports the school, the center around which everything in the neighborhood revolves.
When one pumpkin night follows another, it seems that nothing changes.
But some things definitely need to change. Because five years ago, Pumpkin Night ended before it began, as a black mushroom cloud exploded and boiled into the sky, taking the lives we had planned and scattering them in all directions.
On that night in 2008, New Zealand added another name, the Tamahere Fire, to its list of tragedies.
Another son, husband, father, and friend, firefighter Derek Lovell, was added to the list of those who went to work one day and never returned home.
Another small community suffered from a gas explosion that ripped through a village cold storage facility and burned for seven days.