Gallantry case progress

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Kathy Stewart, the mother of Private David Stewart, with Chief of Army Major General John Boswell at the dedication ceremony. Photo / NZ Defence Force

From WO1 (rtd) Bob Davies, via ONWARD BAR…please note that this is massive progress but not a battle won yet…

For non-Kiwi followers, David Stewart gave his life on Mt Ruapehu in August 1990 to ensure that other soldiers in his group survived the blizzard that had trapped them on the mountain…

David Edward Whawhai Stewart NZBM

The Minister received us warmly and listened carefully to our arguments. It was clear he was aware of the issues and had familiarised himself with the facts. He let slip that he had been talking to a number of people including our late friend and champion, Sir Wira Gardiner, whose influence clearly stretches beyond the grave.

Besides the three of us it has been a real team effort that included Dr Jim Mather (ex-RNZA officer), David Samuels (ex-RNZIR officer), Brigadier (Rtd) Phil Gibbons, Hon Col 1 RNZIR, Lt Col Logan Vaughan, CO 1 RNZIR, WO1 Chad Halley, RSM 1 RNZIR, Rear Admiral David Ledson, Chief of Navy (Rtd), Sir Jerry Mataparae, GG (Rtd) and Karl du Fresne (journalist).

Whereas before I was not optimistic. I am now. But no whooping and hollering yet. We should hear by the New Year. Here was our argument in a nutshell:

On 13 August 2022, 32 years after the tragedy, David Stewart’s sacrifice was recognised when the theatrette In Wellington Lines, home of his unit, the First Battalion, the Royal New Zealand Infantry Regiment, was named after him.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/whanganui-chronicle/news/army-honours-private-david-stewart-who-died-saving-others-in-ruapehu-blizzard/SARNYNWKOO4V3IWWXM7TO7VZAU/

https://karldufresne.blogspot.com/2022/08/its-taken-32-years-but-david-stewarts.html

Hopefully, by New Year, or possibly in the New Year’s Honours List, David Stewart’s New Zealand Bravery award will be elevated to the New Zealand Cross.

It’s long overdue…

The Last View

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For the last four years, my rear view on the way home has been something like this…not always wet, sometimes icy or, in the first year, snowing…

Last night was my last…

What was meant to be a six or so month gig to learn a bit more about hospo turned into a four year rollercoaster…learned so much from Spud and Davo, Jase, Keely and Carleen, El Loco, Elise, Caoimhe, Herve, Lydia, Toby, G-man, Koletso and Eddie…

Staff or customers, you get to socialise with the most eclectix mix..Schnapps is an icon not just in National Park Village but across the Central North Island, possible the world, the only pub with views of three active volcanoes, the best burgers and the best crew…

.Going off to do some other stuff for a couple of months and then see what happens next…

I didn’t know Jake

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This is Jake. Jake Millar.

I didn’t know Jake, In fact, until yesterday morning, his name was unfamiliar to me, although I had heard of his business, Unfiltered.

Jake was a young Kiwi entrepreneur who leveraged success with a high school business into Unfiltered. Unfiltered’s “thing” was interviewing high profile business leaders and making those interviews commercially available as training resources. It must have been a good idea as Unfiltered attracted around $4.9million in investor support.

Jake died a couple of days ago. Allegedly by his own hand. He was 26.

He had recently sold Unfiltered for a small sum, around $80k, possibly plus some stock in the purchasing company. The Otago Daily Times understates the response from investors as “Investors expressed some frustration at the sale of the business“. Overnight, Jake went from golden boy to devil’s spawn.

Investors and media hounded him around the world. They threatened friends who stood up for him. They attacked and attacked and attacked. Leading this assault was the rabid pack of hyenas known as the New Zealand media.

The fourth estate has some brilliant dedicated insightful writers but as a business group, our media has long side sold itself for click-based gratification, ambush journalism and gotcha articles.

It’s always easier to attack than to help, to push down than to pull up.

Startups fail. It’s a rule. Not all of them but a lot of them. Investors in start-up need to acknowledge risk. They need to do due due dligence and accept that the outcome may not be that which they desire.

Life in the fast lane.

The circumstances surrounding failure may be deliberate or environmental. Some times an idea just doesn’t find its place or time. Some time a decision goes the wrong way. Soem imes the markets changes. Sometimes a great whopping global pandemic comes along. Always though there is risk.

Life in the fast lane.

Many of the hyenas have accused Jake of living a high life, and of squandering investors’ money on that high life. But they present no evidence to support those accusations. When challenged, they threatened and attacked Jake’s friends and supporters.

They didn’t like the way Jake dressed or the shoes he wore. So what…? Business skill and dress sense are irrevocably linked. This is a young guy who sold his first business for six figures to the notoriously frugal New Zealand Government – while he was still at school. His list of interviewees is long and distinguished.

As an invest prospect, Jake and Unfiltered probably looked pretty good. But there’s always risk.

And no one deserves to be hunted and hounded just because they struggle to maintain initial success, certainly not by those who haven’t taken or can’t take- that’s you, NZ media – the plunge into high-end entreprenuralism.

When I was doing lesson learned, one of the early ephiphanies was that the best incentive for learning was a good punch in the nose. You don’t learn by walking, you learn by stumbling and getting back up again and stumbling and getting back up again.

Unfiltered was probably not Jake’s final destination. It was more likely a stepping stone on the way to something else. There is nothing to indicate that he wasn’t capable to picking himself up and starting over. He was only 26. Many of his attackers would have already had the same experience, some numerous times.

Except for the media hyenas. Those who cannot. But who choose to judge. Who stalk and and harass. Who threaten and attack when challenged.

Hardly the most professional of communication

National Business Review can say it was just doing its job, that it has to push hard to get the facts but really, all it was doing was bullying under the guise of journalism. Every good journo in New Zealand should be calling this behaviour out. Not just the publication but the individual staff that are doing it and the management that are allowing it.

If you;re going to read aout Jake, read the ODT. Or read Jenene’s post on the nasty side of this. Or read both.

Ignore NBR. But do contact your MP and shadow MP and ask then what they are going to do to introduce New Zealand’s media (or elements thereof) to the concepts of accountability and responsibility.

Do it for Jake.

MaksArt Yak-130 progress

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In the world of paper model designers, MaksArt is a rising shining star. Over the last decade he has designed and released 80+ very detailed and very buildable models, all of Russian subjects. All his designs are very generously free to download, although some have also been picked up – in slightly different versions – by some of the mainstream model publishers.

MaksArt’s current project is the Yak-130, which he has been working on over the northern summer. It’s almost at the stage of a test build and is looking pretty good. Here’s a little teaser of what the design is looking like so far:

The level of detail is quite amazing, more so when you remember that the start point for each part is a flat 2D piece of paper…

Someone’s brothers, someone’s sons

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Below is the text of an address delivered by former Sergeant-Major of the New Zealand Army, Bob Davies, at the Onward Bar in Taupo on ANZAC Day 2021.

“This morning I will to relate to you an action that upheld the finest traditions of one of the New Zealand Army’s premier fighting units, the 1st Battalion, the Royal New Zealand Infantry Regiment, the only battalion that has added a Battle Honour to its colours since World War 2. Unlike most stories this Anzac Day though this is not one about combat in far-flung fields. It is a story that played out very close to here some thirty years ago. A story as epic as any that will be told this Anzac Day and unfortunately a story too few in New Zealand know much about. It is a story about two senior soldiers and another young man who demonstrated they are cut from the same cloth that the finest of this Regiment has seen. These soldiers were involved in an incident that claimed more lives than any other single action since WW2.

On the morning of Thursday 9 August 1990, 10 soldiers from B Company, 1 RNZIR, together with a Naval rating and two instructors from the Army Adventurous Training Centre, commenced a mountaineering course on Mount Ruapehu. 13 personnel departed Waiouru Camp that morning. Only seven returned.

The weather on the 9th of August was very good, with clear skies and light winds. The group spent the first day, a Thursday, climbing to the summit and conducted some practical training.On Friday, the group spent the day constructing two snow caves and a snow dome and then slept that night in those shelters. The next morning, Saturday, the weather deteriorated significantly, with very strong northerly winds and very low visibility. The group remained sheltering in their snow caves for a second night. On the following day (Sunday), the decision was made by the instructors to move back to the Dome Shelter. It was from then on that serious difficulties began to develop.

On leaving the shelter of their snow caves, the group was exposed to the full force of the storm that had now developed. Visibility was reduced to a few meters and the wind had significantly increased to an estimated strength of around 150kph; strong enough to lift members of the group off the ground. The decision was made to halt and attempts made to dig trenches and use the packs to provide some shelter from the wind. The group was now on the flat Col, approximately 200 meters from the Dome Shelter; probably the most exposed position on the mountain at that time.

After remaining in this location for two to three hours, a second, unsuccessful attempt was made to find the Dome Shelter. It was then that the first hypothermic cases became apparent. The group stopped whilst casualties were attended to and attempts were made to construct a snow shelter. This proved impossible due to the ferocity of the storm. The group then attempted to “dig in” in that location. At this point, two members of the group were hypothermic, one was suffering from frost bite and a number of others close to exhaustion. A decision was made to seek assistance and the senior instructor, Sgt Snowden, together with Pte Brendon Burchell, departed down the mountain. The time was now approximately 1630hrs.

Throughout that night, the storm continued with the same ferocious intensity. By this time, the soldiers were without any experienced leadership, as the lone instructor left on the mountain had become non-effective. Ptes David Stewart and Sonny Te Rure (now known as Sonny Tavake) constantly moved about the group, offering encouragement and attempting to alleviate the suffering by giving over some of their own clothing and equipment. They were assisted in their efforts by LCpl Culloty and Pte Berger.

In the words of LCpl Culloty “….word filtered back that an instructor had gone for help and for the remainder to break out their sleeping bags. By the time this reached Pte’s Stewart, Tavake, and myself, those that were able had done so, however 3 – 4 soldiers displaying signs of hypothermia, were incapable of this. We gathered them into a group and Ptes Stewart and Tavake went in search of packs to get the sleeping bags out. This was no easy task as visibility was near zero and many packs were buried in snow that became ice in a very short period or had blown away. Each time a sleeping bag was found, they came back to the group and took one away and put him in a sleeping bag as best they could.

They left finding sleeping bags for themselves until last. They came back to find the last person there (myself) had collapsed. Pte Stewart dragged me to a bag and managed to get my legs and lower torso into it. He then put a survival bag around my upper body. There was by then only one sleeping bag for Ptes Stewart and Tavake as no other packs could be found. They covered themselves as best they could.As the night progressed the direction of the wind changed constantly, resulting in large amounts of snow building up on my chest then freezing solid. As the weight increased, I began to have difficulties breathing and called for help. Pte Stewart leaned over and eventually was able to clear the snow and ice off my chest allowing me to breathe normally. He did this approximately six times during the night. Later, a soldier not far from me had his bag blown away and I got him to join me, and in doing so, my survival bag blew away, so we used the remainder of my sleeping bag to cover our heads and shoulders.

Later a soldier from the end of the group crawled over and said that the person he had been sharing a bag with had died. We told him to go back, remove the body from the bag, and get in, and he left to do so. He then came back and said that he could not find his sleeping bag (I assume it had already been covered with snow). He asked if he could join me and the soldier with me, and I told him no, as there was no room and that he should find somebody with a bag to themselves. He returned a short time later having found no shelter, and again asked for help. At this point, Pte Stewart told him to join him and Pte Tavake in their single sleeping bag. In doing this, their sleeping bag was blown away and the three of them were without any shelter whatsoever.

After this, we began to grow weaker and weaker. The soldier who had been with Ptes Stewart and Tavake crawled over beside my head and began talking incoherently and died. Some hours later the soldier who was sheltering with me became delirious and died also.After many hours, when I occasionally called out and received no reply, I assumed that all but myself had perished. Later the weather, though still extreme, lessened in intensity for a while and I made contact with others and we were subsequently rescued. As we were brought into the Dome Shelter, I was surprised and pleased to see Pte Tavake, and we were both shocked that only five of us had survived. It seemed impossible that Pte Stewart, given his physical and moral strength, leadership and selflessness, should have died.

I have no doubt in my mind that if he had chosen to take care of himself he would be here today. He chose instead to put others before himself and to risk time and again, his own survival to help those unable to help themselves. All this in an extreme environment where we novices were left to our own devices. I would not be here today but for his actions. That is the man he was.”

Around 0530hrs on Monday Sgt Snowden and Pte Burchell having walked some 13 hours through the night, made physical contact with an Alpine Lift staff member who contacted the Duty DOC Ranger. The search and recovery then commenced. The first recovery team reached the Dome Shelter at approximately 1300hrs, and on finding nobody there, descended to the Col where they located the group. They found only 5 survivors who were then moved to the Dome Shelter.

In due course a Court of Inquiry was established to investigate the loss of life. Among other findings, the Court noted the “outstanding courage and bravery” shown by a number of the group, namely Ptes Stewart, Tavake and Burchell. In the case of Pte Burchell, the Citation noted that “..Private Burchell not only had to cope with the most extreme conditions but, because of his lack of experience, he had no knowledge of how to overcome them. His courage and determination and perseverance to continue in the face of extraordinary adversity not only brought great credit on himself, but certainly assisted in the rescue of the survivors…” The Court recommended they be formally recognised with an appropriate bravery award. In the case of Stewart that was to be with the award of the George Cross. Under the imperial honours system then extant, the level one award, and now the New Zealand Cross. Some nine years later Ptes Stewart, Tavake and Burchell were finally awarded the New Zealand Bravery Medal, a level 4 award, the lowest that recognises bravery. Of significance, the Citation noted that, despite the dreadful conditions, “…Privates Stewart and Tavake maintained a continual vigil over their companions throughout most of the night, providing what assistance they could.” The Citation further noted that “.. Private Stewart would have been fully aware that his actions in continually moving out of shelter and the warmth of his sleeping bag to assist those with hypothermia, meant he had an increased chance of also becoming a casualty. He was also aware that he was becoming increasingly exhausted by continually battling the elements.” It added that “Privates Stewart and Tavake displayed selfless care of the casualties and their sense of responsibility to their companions testify to their bravery”.

It is also worthy of note that both Stewart and Tavake had spent most of their soldiering in the tropical conditions of SEA from which they had only relatively recently returned. Moreover, these soldiers battled the life-threatening conditions for almost two days without concern for their own safety. In doing so Stewart died and Tavake still suffers from the effects of severe frost bite.

The following are so far the only two recipients of the New Zealand Cross:

On 24 April 1992 Jacinda Margaret Amey was one of five members of a Meteorological Service team, stationed on the remote sub-Antarctic Campbell Island, who were snorkelling when one of them, Mr Mike Fraser, was attacked by a shark, believed to be a white pointer. The other swimmers, apart from Ms Amey, swam to shore. Ms Amey waited until the shark moved away from Mr Fraser and then went to his aid and towed him to shore. Mr Fraser had lost his right forearm and his left forearm was severely lacerated and appeared to be broken. He was having trouble breathing and required urgent medical treatment. Having got him to shore, Ms Amey then joined the rest of the team in doing what they could for Mr Fraser until he could be flown to New Zealand. Ms Amey displayed great courage and bravery with complete disregard for her own safety in going to Mr Fraser’s assistance.

And the second recipient:

On 9 June 1995, Reginal John Dixon, aged 47, and his wife were passengers on Ansett New Zealand Flight 703 when the aircraft crashed in the Tararua Ranges near Palmerston North. Mr Dixon escaped from the wreckage with fractures. However, despite his injuries, he returned to the aircraft to help other passengers trapped in the wreckage. As a result of this selfless action, he was critically burned when a flash fire broke out on the left wing of the aircraft near a hole in the fuselage from which he was helping passengers escape. He was hospitalised and underwent surgery and skin grafts. Mr Dixon remained in a coma, and although he made some initial improvement, his condition worsened and he died two weeks later, the fourth victim of the crash. The situation in which Mr Dixon found himself was extremely dangerous and he displayed great bravery in returning to the aircraft, although injured, to help other passengers which subsequently resulted in the loss of his own life. His bravery undoubtedly ensured that the loss of life was not greater.I ask you were David Stewart’s actions over almost two days not equally as heroic as these two New Zealand Cross recipients? If so why then was he not appropriately recognised with a level one award.

There was another climber on the mountain that day, a Japanese George Iwama, who remained there for 5 days during the same blizzard. He related: ‘There was a white-out and terrible freezing conditions 20 or 35 minutes after I left the snow cave… ‘I couldn’t locate where I was walking and I decided to dig another snow cave.’ He of course survived.

I ask you: was it that the award of the New Zealand Cross would have brought undue attention to the very real shortcomings of the New Zealand Army and its Army Adventurous Training Centre?

I’ll let you decide.

The latest Listener has an excellent 5 page article on this tragedy by Karl Du Fresne.

More to follow…

National Park Village housing crisis

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This is the general area of the National Park ward, part of the Ruapehu district. Most of the population is rural, with the main population centres all being small with permanent populations of around 200 each in National Prk, Raurimu and Owhango. The ward is unusual in that it also represents the interests of the population of Whakapapa Village at the base of Mt Ruapehu.

National Park Village is the major population and business centre in the National Park ward. It has a permanent population of around 200 but commercial beds for over 1000 visitors and a disproportionately large number of businesses for its size. It enjoys the distintinction of being New Zealand’s highest town @825 metres above sea level.

Tongariro Alpine Crossing

National Park Village is the gateway to Tongariro National Park, including:

  • The Tongariro Alpine Crossing, one of New Zealand’s best day walks.
  • The Northern Circuit, one of New Zealand’s Great Walks, that skirts Mt Tongariro and circumnavigates Mt Ngauruhoe.
  • The Round the Mountain trail, around Mt Ruapehu.
  • Whakapapa Skifield, one of the most popular, if not the most popular, snow tourism attractions in New Zealand.
  • A range of shorter day walks including Tama Lakes, Taranaki Falls, Silica Rapids and Tupapakurua Falls.
  • Nodes on the Te Araroa Trail and National Cycle Way that run the length of New Zealand.

While COVID-19 is having an obviously effect on tourism around New Zealand, smaller centres like National Park are more likely to come out of this crisis better than larger tourism-oriented centres like Queenstown and Rotorua.Things will change but most businesses here will endure and will still need staff in numbers greater than the local supply.

National Park Village has a crisis, a housing crisis. A large number of businesses mean staff numbers out of proportion to the village’s size and permanent population. Its alpine environment means that winter commuting from other centres like Turangi, Taumarunui, Raetihi or Ohakune (each 40-50km away) can be problematic assuming that staff have vehicles in the first place.

Staff may or may not have their own vehicle and those that do not have no public transport service to rely on for daily travel to/from work or even for shopping/life support/sanity. It is understood – and has been for a long time – that staff working in National Park businesses need accommodation in the Village.

The rise of Bookabach, AirBnB et al over the last decade mean that there are no incentives for local home owners to offer long term accommodation that can be used by staff. The rewards and flexibility of short term rentals simply outweigh any perceived advantages of longer term relationships:

  • Short term overnight rental rates approximate weekly rates for long term rental.
  • Properties remain available for owner’s use.
  • High turnover and rewards mean less incentives to invest in healthy homes compliance for heating and insulation.
  • Short term rentals offer less perceived risk of dodgy tenants.

The Department of Conservation maintains its own staff accommodation estates in Whakapapa and National Park Village. Traditionally, surplus accommodation in these estates has been available to staff from other local businesses. However, the primary purpose of that accommodation is for DOC staff and as local Treaty resolutions firm up, there is a possibility that these estates will be part of the resolution package.

Whakapapa Village

The work around for many businesses in National Park and Whakapapa Villages is simply to provide accommodation for its staff. The four major employers in Whakapapa Village all provide staff accommodation as do the larger proportion of businesses in National Park Village. This is usually in the form of a house or houses owned by the business and available to staff as a flatting environment; or accommodation providers putting aside for staff a proportion of what would otherwise be income-earning accommodation. Either way, this is a considerable overhead cost for each of these businesses.

In the last three years there has been increasing pressure on seasonal accommodation for winter ski field staff. That has been mitigated to some extent this year with borders being closed and RAL et al having to depend more on locals for staff. As economic recovery continues, so will the need for full-time and seasonal staff drawn from outside the ward and the district.To its credit, RAL provides transport for its staff: ultimately though, this overhead will cap out as staff are forced to live further and further afield.

These issues are not new nor are they unknown. Last year, community leaders expreseed their concerns at the detrimental effects of the lack of long term rental accommodation in the National Park ward, especially National Park and Raurimu Villages. Not only does the lack of accommodation directly affect local businesses but it also ripples out into reduced school rolls; smaller recruiting pools for local emergency services and reduced coverage where members may be forced to live out of reasonable response times; and reduced domestic business.

The Ruapehu District Council has recently received approval for Government seed funding for housing projects in the Ruapehu district. This has been the result of various internal studies looking at both district needs and the potential for the district to benefit from COVID recovery initiatives. I’ve attended a number of those internal council workshops and community board meetings and raised these concerns. It was quite clear from the most recent workshop that having received this approval, the council didn’t actually have the faintest idea what to do with it or where to apply it.

In an attempt to remedy this, the Council has conducted housing huis in Taumarunui, Raetihi and Ohakune – nothing in the National Park ward. The Council’s response to challenges on this is that residents of the ward can submit directly to the council if they want to make their views known.

National Park Community Board meeting 13 October 2020

From the brief to the Community Board on Tuesday evening, it would appear that the Ruapehu District Council has decided that its contribution to the housing initiaive will be land ie land that it owns. That’s not much good to National Park where the council doesn’t own any significant land but where arguably the need is greatest – if anyone is serious about maintaining and fostering economic development in the district.

The council has been clear that it is looking for a low risk option for its housing initiative. Investing in long term rental accommodation in National Park is LOW RISK. These are tenants that don’t need assistance or subsidisation: they are all in jobs and receiving wages. Further, most if not all of them, bring skills and experience to the district. Historically, many of them put down roots here and eventually buy their own home, start families and contribute to the community in many ways. They are assets.

They are also assets that are declining jobs here because they can not find accommodation, especially for couples and families. One family spent a year living in a single room accommodation in one of the lodges until they were able to secure a rental home; there are couples sharing a room in flalting arrangements because long term rental accommodation is so hard to find.

Privately-run rental accommodation offers little security to individuals, couples or families because the incentives for owners to sell are so great. I ended up buying ahead of my schedule when my rented home was sold last year – ironically, its new owners contacted me this week after I raised this issue on local Facebook pages and they confirmed their intention to make it available for long term rentals once the current refurbishment is complete.

There is a clear need for a DOC-style estate in National Park Village. By this I mean a mix of one or two bedroom apartments and three bedroom houses similar to the current DOC estate in the Village. To avoid the attractions of short term commercial rentals, this estate needs to be run by central or local government – or in partnership with business agencies where the provision of long-term rental accommodation is protected.

If the Ruapehu District Council’s contribution is to be land only, there is land suitable for such an estate on the market in National Park Village as I write. It won’t be there for long.

The need in National Park Village has been articulated to the Council on many occasions, from both perspectives of welfare and economic development. What this requires is that the Council move with speed that is greater then that which it is accustomed to. Not just wisely-nodding heads that then go off and do whatever they want to to do.

I’m proposing that that Ruapehu District Council:

  • acqiure land in or close to National Park Village specifically for the development of a housing estate for staff employed in local businesses (including agencies like National Park Primary School).
  • Independently or in partnership with a government or private agency construct a rental housing estate for couples and families employed with the ward.
  • Consider opportunities to boost availbale renayl accommodation during peak seasons pending the outcome of COVID recovery. This may include establishing transport conenctions to housing in Owhango, and other centres north of National Park (south of the Village may be challenging in winter).
  • Adopt a strategy and polciies to ensure that accommodation remains available to meet the need in National Park i.e. to restrain the temptation for greater ROI through short term rentals.

This is the low risk option for the Ruapehu District Council.

It contributes to economic development in the district.

It addresses social and welfare issues arising from the lack of long term rental accommodation in National Park Village.

It operates at market rates, reducing risk and outlay for the Council.

Ruapehu District Council Social and Affordable Housing


Airfix Gnat – the original…

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I couldn’t resist this when it appeared on Trademe (our national equivalent of Ebay) just as our COVID-19 lockdown period ended and normal(-ish) services resumed… Airfix has more recently (in the last decade or so) released a complete new tool of this classic little British aircraft – perhaps more recognisable from Hotshots? – that meets […]

Airfix Gnat – the original…

Rambo: Last Blood

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A movie that should never had been made…and that didn’t need to be…

To be honest, I probably only bought this because a. it is too damn easy to buy stuff through Mighty Ape and b. because it completes the John Rambo collection (hopefully not until another one!). Last Blood adds nothing to the Rambo saga: , the characters are two dimensional and the plot is non-existent, serving only to enables reprises of ‘John Rambo has 100 ways of killing – and they all work‘… (apologies to Charles Bronson’s The Mechanic).

The saga never needed a final movie for closure: Rambo did that well, as did each of the movie prior, from First Blood, through Rambo: Part 2 and then Part 3. Each movies allows the watcher to walk away satisfied leaving no heavy issues for later pondering.

Last Blood could have a been a totally different – and better movie – without resurrecting the spectre of the bitter angry out-of-control veteran. It’s not worth your money…if you must watch it, watch for it to turn up on your streaming service of choice.

If it doesn’t though, no great loss…

Ski road access facts 2020

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Why skiing is like religion

Here are some facts:

My rights are being violated.

Unless you have a Platinum Pass, your season or life pass provides you no more guarantee of access of parking than it has any other year. Your Fair Trading or Consumer Guarantee rights have not been violated. Perceived inconvenience due to change is not a violation.

While we’re on the subject, your season or life pass doesn’t give you any special rights at all. Further you’re not contributing nearly as usefully as your average casual snow tourist.

Be nice

The rights that you are guaranteed are in the NZ Bill of Rights. In essence, they say be nice to other people.

The staff at the ski fields, working on the roads, in the I-Sites and the Visitors’ Centre, in other local businesses and on social media are just doing their jobs. 17 generations of skiing on Ruapehu, season/life pass ownership, and/or an enhanced sense of entitlement do not give you any right or privilege to be rude, abusive or threatening.

It’s a public road – you can’t stop us.

The Bruce Road is not a public road. It is a special purpose road, managed under law by DOC, sub-delegated to TPP for operational management. Like Mangatepopo Road, it can be closed or otherwise controlled for any number of reasons, safety concerns are the most common reason.

We’ll walk up then

Attempting to walk up the Bruce Road from the barrier would probably deemed a safety issue when the snow berms obstructs the shoulder and vehicles are driving on ice and snow. Darwin will appreciate the validation though…

There’s no real problem

Everyone who has been saying there’s not really a problem is either in lala land or is a first time visitor. Since at least 2014, traffic congestion on SH48 and the Bruce Road has blocked access for visitors, commercial traffic and emergency services.

The ‘first in’ approach to parking has become less and less effective over the same period. As a result, more and more visitors have been departing overnight locations earlier and earlier to try to get a park. This means increasing number of vehicles on the roads above 900 metres where ice is most common and at the times it is most likely…just trying to get in for a park.

photo credit Mt Ruapehu, Whakapapa & Tūroa Ski Areas

The sightseers are spoiling it for everyone.

The sightseers are now representative of ‘everyone’. The market has changed since Happy Valley was upgraded and the Snow Factory commissioned in 2017, and the Sky Waka was launched in 2019. Snow tourism and snow play are now more significant parts of the market – they are also better behaved and less rude.

We pay for parking already

Not yet you don’t. It costs DOC and RAL to maintain the car parks and the Bruce Road for non-commercial visitor traffic. Visitors to the ski fields only contribute to this indirectly via tax and passes.

Introducing a car park booking system was not the only option. It would have been as easy to close the Bruce Road to all but commercial vehicles and rerole the car parks for more profitable purposes eg skating, and require all visitors to catch commercial transport. This would have the side effect of reducing transport costs due to economies of bulk – when you bitch about the costs of transport services, be careful what you wish for.

You can’t stop us parking on the roadside.

Neither SH48 nor the Bruce Road have a road reserve. if you park off the road, you are technically parking inside the Park outside a designated parking area. DOC can and has enforced this in the past. For bonus points, if parking off the road, and if you are too tight to put your pets into a motel you will get zapped twice.

Tukino, here we come…

How long do you think it will be before the management at Tukino starts to adopt similar practices to control numbers..? For the same reasons…

RAL is blocking access to the Park for hikers (and swimmers)

Access to Scoria Flat is not being blocked. However, such access has been abused by elements of the ski community previously. You do get that license plate numbers are being tracked this year? It’s not a big leap that vehicles that abuse this access will be restricted.

This will hurt locals

Most locals and local businesses favour the changes. I work and live here and yesterday’s statement from our Mayor Don Cameron sums up local sentiment:

Ruapehu Mayor Don Cameron said that the new Whakapapa and Turoa ski area car park booking system is part of the commitment to giving visitors the best possible experience while helping to manage other critical issues such as road safety, the environment and maintaining Kaitiakitanga (guardianship) and Manaakitanga (host) responsibilities.

rdc-3-jul-2020-2Download

If you’re going to claim that these changes will adversely affect local communities and businesses, be specific. State your sources. Identify which businesses you claim to be representing. I speak to dozens of locals and visitors every day. Your views are not the majority view, not by a good country kilometre…

Just book out all the parks, then don’t use them

You can free your booked parked if for some reason you cannot use it. There will probably be those that try to sabotage the system with false bookings. The Crimes Act covers this kind of offence. Abuse may lead to a requirement for a credit card to be register for purposes of identification. RAL hasn’t made any statement one way or another but it would be a reasonable assumption that frequent no-show offenders may be subject to some form of restriction.

Your choice

RAL had a less than stellar 2019. The Sky Waka construction prevented summer 18/19 being business as usual, a five week weather system caused an unusually long close period, and various issues and teething problems affected the later part of the season. Planning for the winter season was underway in February and March, just in time for all of the to be knocked back by COVID-19 and the lockdown. It’s a fair assumption that RAL is currently heavily influenced by its financiers, hindering its ability to make experience-based decisions.

COVID has affected all of us here on the Volcanic Plateau and we don’t really know what the future will bring. Visitor numbers in levels 3 and 4 have probably been better than expected but with no indication whether this is the new normal or just a slowly deflating bubble as new financial realities hit home.

The constant carping from the entitled and ignorant minority only undermines what we are doing in Ruapehu. If you don’t like it and feel that strongly, then don’t come…a small bitter minority will not be missed…

Midway 1976

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The original Midway movie has been on my mind since I was underwhelmed by the 2019 version. Tonight I made the effort to watch it again.

Either I have grown up somewhat or I was too harsh in my original judgement of it – which is probably why I have avoided it for years – but it is not as bad as I remember it.

It has a similarly contemporary stellar cast to Midway 2019 so it’s not like the quality of the actors is a factor in the failure of 2019; certainly the quality of the acting is though. I feel that the modern attempt simply lacks an awareness of basic storytelling and instead falls back on a series of cliches and one-liners that totally fail to impart any sense of urgency or drama to the story.

Watching Midway 1976 tonight, I really felt the gravity of a battle on which both sides depended for strategic survival. Ultimately for the US, Midway was the end of the beginning; for Japan it was the beginning of the end…that sense of urgency, of great issues at stake, comes through so much better in the 1976 version.

Even though it relies on live footage for most of its combat scenes, the earlier version acknowledges it in the opening credits. Even though some of the scenes cut JAG-like between aircraft types…what was a Vindicator is now a Dauntless is now a Hellcat…it is remarkable effective, more so when one remembers that this footage is of actual young men in combat, where an aircraft explodes in flame or smashes into the ocean, there are actual people aboard…It’s a lot smoother than the incredibly-detailed but chaotically-edited digital imagery of the latter version.

The earlier production also relies heavily on surviving aircraft from the era: the J2F Duck parked outside HQ CINCPAC (fond memories of the Airfix Duck that I finished in a night and painted with Mum’s oil colours – which took a year to cure!); stubby F4F Wildcats on the deck of one of the carriers (Dad brought me one back from one of his trips to Wellington – finished in a day but used the right(-ish) paints this time; and the Catalinas that spotted the Japanese fleet and rescued Ensign George Day, the sole survivor of Torpedo Squadron 8, who spent the day of the battle avoiding attention as he floated in the middle of the Japanese fleet.

1976 makes only scant mention of Pearl Harbor and starts with Jimmy Doolittle’s daring launch from the Hornet on 18 April 1982 with black and white footage from (I think, I’ve never seen the movie) Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo. In the first 10-15 minutes, Midway The Earlier has established the Doolittle Raid as the chief catalyst for the Japanese drive on Midway, and established the Japanese objective “AF” as Midway. It does this without any smug smiles or glib one-liners: the characters of Nimitz, Fletcher, Rochefort, etc are well-played and feel authentic.

On the Japanese side, the characters are more Western than their portrayal in either Pearl Harbor or Midway 2019; we are spared the contemporary fascination with subtitles in favour of clear unaccented English. Even so, the characters feel less like caricatures than their modern equivalents, less 2D and more like real people. And Midway 1976 depicts the Japanese as people as well, not the brutal barbarians shown in Pearl Harbor and Midway 2019.

Midway was THE battle that changed the course of the Pacific War: Coral Sea stopped the Japanese advance south, Midway turned them around. After Midway everything was downhill for Japan. It’s a tale that deserves to be told well. Give the 1976 Midway a second chance and hunt down some of the excellent reading available on the battle…