Nearly a year after Auckland's convention centre went up in flames and brought the city centre to a standstill, a report has raised concerns about the length of the shifts some firefighters put in.
Cordons around SkyCity. Photo: RNZ / Patrice Allen
The 150 firefighters involved in battling the SkyCity blaze last year acquitted themselves well in handling the mammoth task according to an external review into the fire which concluded that firefighters could not have prevented the extensive loss and damage the fire - which brought central Auckland to a standstill for several days - caused.
But it has also recommended a slew of changes to Fire and Emergency operations - raising concerns about long shifts leaving some on aerial machinery 'too tired to operate safely' and suggesting it became too complex for the Auckland command unit.
Kerry Gregory, the National Commander of Fire and Emergency New Zealand, said that, with any callout, you don't know what you're dealing with until it's in front of you.
"One of the complications we had there was our initial approach was for firefighters going on the roof with hoselines and putting it out, but straight away we got advice from the structural engineers that it wasn't going to be safe for our firefighters so that meant we had to eliminate that approach."
There were reports that staff were on site for 24 hours which Gregory says is "not acceptable".
"We'll be making sure that doesn't happen again."
Another aspect highlighted in the report was that the Auckland unit should have considered bringing in outside help. Gregory said it was a "good learning" to take from it.
