Buttle brothers argue in Auckland court that tour operators to blame for deaths of 22 people, including 14 Australians
The owners of an island volcano in New Zealand that erupted in 2019 killing 22 people, including 14 Australians, have launched an appeal against their criminal conviction for violating safety laws.
They argue that tour operators – rather than their company – were responsible for the safety of visitors to Whakaari, also known as White Island.
Continue reading...New Zealand judge Evangelos Thomas criticised failures of safety audits given ‘obvious risks’ that led to 2019 fatal eruption
A New Zealand court has found the owner of White Island/Whakaari, the offshore volcano that erupted in 2019, killing 22 people, guilty on one charge of breaching workplace safety laws.
On Tuesday, Auckland district court ruled Whakaari Management Limited (WML), the holding company of landowners Andrew, James and Peter Buttle, had not met its obligations to visitors to the volcano.
Continue reading...White Island/Whakaari volcano exploded in 2019, prompting debate over natural hazard tourism
The landowners of a New Zealand volcano that fatally erupted in 2019 have rejected arguments from the country’s workplace safety regulator that they ultimately managed and controlled activities on the island and bore legal responsibility for whether visitors to it were safe.
When White Island/Whakaari exploded on 9 December 2019, 22 people were killed – 17 of them Australians – with 25 others injured. It prompted renewed debate about controls for natural hazard tourism in New Zealand.
Continue reading...Two of six defendants successfully applied on Tuesday to have charges over alleged workplace health and safety breaches dropped
A judge has dismissed charges against two of the three tourism agencies accused of negligence in the lead-up to the New Zealand volcanic eruption that killed 14 Australians.
Three tourism businesses and the three owners of Whakaari, also known as White Island, had originally gone on trial in July over alleged workplace health and safety breaches.
Continue reading...Individual charges against Andrew, James and Peter Buttle dropped, though their company still faces charges over deadly eruption
The three brothers who owned Whakaari/White Island at the time of its deadly eruption had the individual charges against them thrown out by a New Zealand judge on Tuesday, two months into their trial.
The sudden eruption in December 2019 came as tour groups were visiting the island volcano. The explosion killed 22 people, 17 of them Australians, and seriously injured 25 others.
Continue reading...US couple gives evidence to New Zealand court in case against island’s owners and tourism operators
An American couple who were badly burned when Whakaari/White Island erupted in December 2019, killing 22 of the 47 people in its crater, told a New Zealand court that neither their guides nor anyone else involved in their trip to the crater told them that such an event was likely – or even possible. Information about the dangers they faced on the island volcano was minimal, they said, and safety protections lax.
Evidence from Matthew Urey, 40, and Lauren Urey, 36, opened the prosecution’s case in the Auckland district court on Wednesday, beginning a lengthy trial for the island’s owners and other tourism companies involved in the ill-fated trip.
Continue reading...Two years ago New Zealand’s Whakaari volcano eruption killed 22 people and changed the lives of many others forever
On a pristine day two years ago, a group of mostly international day-trippers boarded boats and chugged over to Whakaari/White Island, a small active volcano and popular tourist destination 48km off New Zealand’s east coast. The guests roamed the moon-like landscape, observing the strangeness of a bubbling, living rock. But below the surface, pressure was building.
At 2.11pm, while 47 people were on the island, the volcano erupted, spewing a mushroom cloud of steam, gases, rock and ash into the air. The eruption killed 22 people, seriously injured 25 and changed the lives of many families forever. It became the country’s deadliest volcanic disaster since the 1886 eruption of Mount Tarawera.
Continue reading...Ten parties charged under health and safety laws and three charged as directors or individuals over Whakaari explosion which killed 22
New Zealand’s workplace safety watchdog has charged 13 parties as part of its investigation into last December’s White Island/Whakaari volcano eruption. Twenty two people died in the disaster and almost one year on, several survivors are still undergoing treatment for their injuries.
The volcano erupted while 47 people were on the island – including several tour groups and their guides. The victims were from Australia, New Zealand, Germany, China, Britain and Malaysia.
Continue reading...Researchers claim system could save lives in situations like the Whakaari/White Island eruption in 2019, which killed 21 people
New Zealand scientists say they have invented a warning system to predict volcanic eruptions that may prevent future tragedies such as the blast that killed 21 people on White Island/Whakaari in 2019.
University of Auckland academics David Dempsey and Shane Cronin say their research “shows patterns of seismic activity before an eruption that make advance warning possible”.
Continue reading...Australian victim Lisa Dallow awake in a serious but stable condition two months after New Zealand volcano erupted
An Australian woman has come out of her coma, two months after the volcano eruption on New Zealand’s White Island, to be told the blast killed her husband and daughter.
Adelaide woman Lisa Dallow has woken from her coma in Melbourne’s Alfred hospital and is in a serious but stable condition.
Continue reading...Police said Hayden Marshall-Inman of New Zealand and Winona Langford of Australia perished in the disaster
The death toll has risen to 20 from the volcanic eruption on New Zealand’s White Island last month, as two people still missing were officially confirmed dead.
The two people were Hayden Marshall-Inman of New Zealand and Winona Langford of Australia, police said on Thursday.
Continue reading...Four remain in critical condition while two people still missing after 17 killed in New Zealand disaster
More than a dozen people remain in New Zealand hospitals with life-threatening injuries a month on from the fatal eruption of Whakaari White Island.
Seventeen people have been confirmed dead following the 9 December 2018 disaster, with a further two people missing presumed dead.
Continue reading...Police said on Monday that another person died at an Auckland hospital overnight
The death toll from this month’s volcanic eruption in New Zealand has risen to 19 after police said that another person died at an Auckland hospital on Sunday night.
There were 47 people visiting the tourist destination of Whakaari, also known as White Island, when the volcano erupted on 9 December, killing 13 people initially and leaving more than two dozen others hospitalised with severe burns. The latest victim is the sixth person to die in hospitals in New Zealand and Australia in the two weeks since the eruption.
Continue reading...Both bodies are believed to be in the water surrounding Whakaari, with police using tidal models to expand search
The bodies of a local guide and an Australian tourist who died on Whakaari may never be recovered, New Zealand police have said, after days of bad weather hampered search efforts.
Deputy police commissioner Mike Clement told RNZ he believed both bodies were in the sea, but sonar radar and divers had been unable to find them. The search was now being widened beyond Whakaari, also known as White Island, in line with tidal modelling.
Continue reading...Volcanos and fault lines are a part of daily life, but should the tragedy on White Island make us rethink the dangers they pose?
One summer evening in Auckland I got the fright of my life. My house groaned, as though its wooden frame was crying out in pain. The sofa I was lying on began sliding back and forth. I looked up, expecting to tell one of my brothers to cut it out. No one was there. All at once I thought: “This is an earthquake. Auckland doesn’t have earthquakes. Auckland has volcanoes.” I ran to the window and jerked the curtain aside, scanning for the glow of fire in the night sky, then turned on the news. I was terrified. It was finally happening.
It wasn’t. (Just an earthquake, after all, a puny 4.5 on the Richter scale.)
Continue reading...It’s the worst burns incident in New Zealand history, with more than a dozen fatalities and lives still hanging in the balance. Now questions are being asked about how and why it happened. Reporters Eleanor Ainge Roy and Stephen D’Antal discuss how the week unfolded, and the long road ahead to understanding this tragedy
To learn more about this story read Melissa Davey’s piece on the long road ahead for the injured survivors, and Eleanor Ainge Roy’s reporting on how the local Maori people feel about Whakaari.
Continue reading...Krystal Browitt was on White Island with father and sister when eruption occurred
Krystal Browitt, the 21-year-old Melbourne woman missing since the White Island volcano eruption, has become the first victim to be identified by police from the six bodies recovered from the island on Friday.
Browitt was on the island with her sister Stephanie and her father Paul when the volcano erupted. Stephanie is in a coma in hospital with her mother, Marie, who stayed on board their cruise ship instead of taking the volcano trip, at her bedside. Paul Browitt is being treated for burns in hospital in Melbourne.
Continue reading...Recovery won’t be easy for the Australians burned in the New Zealand volcano disaster, but some of the world’s best specialists are on hand to help
As families of the Australian survivors of the New Zealand volcano disaster wait anxiously on their loved ones’ prognosis, there will be a small comfort in knowing that some of the world’s best plastic surgeons and burns specialists will lead their care as they return home for treatment.
Specialist paramedics travelled to New Zealand as part of a medical evacuation team to accompany patients on their return, with 11 Australians flown to major burns units throughout the country including Concord hospital in Sydney and the Alfred hospital in Melbourne. More patients were expected to arrive on Friday evening.
Continue reading...Six bodies transferred to HMNZS Wellington by helicopter, as divers continue search for final two missing
The NZ defence force have released images of those who took part in the mission to recover the remaining bodies from White Island this morning.
We are expecting the New Zealand prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, to hold a news conference in the next few minutes and will bring you that as soon as it begins.
Continue reading...New Zealand’s accident compensation scheme covers cost of treatment for all injuries and bars victims from taking legal action against operators
In New Zealand, where bodies still lie on a volcano after Monday’s eruption and survivors fill hospital burns units across the country to capacity, questions are mounting about who exactly was responsible for the safety of tourists on Whakaari or White Island, and, if failings are found, who will be held accountable.
Questions are also being asked about the wisdom of allowing tourists on to the island while it was assigned a volcanic alert level of two out of five, signalling volcanic unrest – a practice that has happened for years.
Continue reading...