Source: Radio New Zealand
Diggers at work at the site of the fire on Tuesday. RNZ/Jimmy Ellingham
Combined Fire and Emergency and Department of Conservation crews are continuing to put in the ‘grunt work’ on Wednesday dampening down hotspots in the aftermath of the fire that tore through almost 3000 hectares of Tongariro Park at the weekend.
FENZ incident controller Nigel Dravitski said the headquarters for the fire response had shifted to Whakapapa Village as responsibility for its management transitioned to DOC.
About 35 crews were flying out to the fire ground in a helicopter based at the Chateau Tongariro car park.
“There’s good conditions today so we’ve got crews that have entered the fire ground and are continuing to do their monitoring and controlling.”
Dravitski said they were looking for sources of heat or fire from 30m back from the fire across its 35 kilometre perimeter.
“It involves a lot of hard mahi, so digging out and turning out holes. They have things called scotty packs, so they can squirt water into those holes to cool them and take the energy out of them.
“Just really a whole lot of grunt work to be honest.”
Dravitski said crews had a successful day on Tuesday following up on thermal imaging data.
“The crews covered a wide area of the fire scene and it was pleasing there was not a lot of sources of fire, so no active flames or smoke but some heat spots that were very minor in the context of the landscape.
He said so far thermal imaging had found very few areas of concern.
Firefighters were continuing to battle the Tongariro National Park wildfire on Monday. Fire and Emergency NZ
FENZ investigations into how the fire started continue to be focused on a stretch of State Highway 47 close to the entrance of the Tongariro Alpine Crossing.
“That continues to be a point of interest for them and they are continuing their investigation at that point, so we are securing that scene while so they can undertake those tasks.”
A police officer was on site and dozens of coloured flags could be seen planted on the scorched bush beside the road.
Dravitski said any results from that investigation would be some days away.
The Tongariro Alpine Crossing and tracks in the vicinity of Whakapapa Village remain closed until at least Monday next week.
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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand
