Source: Radio New Zealand
Brother Jordan and parents Alicia Toki and Andre Petera with a photo of Karnin “Tino” Petera outside the Whangārei Courthouse. RNZ / Peter de Graaf
A teacher on a fatal caving trip has described how he was convinced he would die as he tried to push students to safety while he was fully submerged in a raging torrent.
The man, who is subject to a non-publication order and cannot be named, was one of two teachers on a fateful Whangārei Boys’ High School outdoor education trip to Abbey Caves on 9 May 2023.
He gave evidence on Monday in a Coroner’s inquest into the death of 15-year-old Karnin Petera, who drowned after his group was caught in a flash flood.
The other 16 boys and two adults managed to get out alive.
The teacher said the trip – one of many he had led through the caves on the outskirts of Whangārei – had started normally, with the boys excited to be underground and enjoying the spectacle of glow worms on the cave walls.
MetService had issued an orange heavy rain warning for Northland but the local forecast for Whangārei indicated only light rain that morning.
Coroner Alexander Ho. RNZ / Peter de Graaf
A band of heavy rain was expected that afternoon so the trip started earlier and was limited to one cave, Organ Cave, instead of the usual three.
The teacher said he had explored Organ Cave after Cyclone Gabrielle, to learn how it was affected by heavy rain, and had found the water to be only knee deep.
He said there was only drizzle when the Year 11 group entered the cave.
The boys had been about to try to make their way through a tight point known as The Squeeze when the teacher noticed the stream rising and the sound of water running through the cave growing louder.
He decided to cut the trip short but as they neared the cave entrance, the stream became a torrent.
It went from waist deep to neck deep “within seconds” and was moving “incredibly quickly”, he said.
The force of the water through the cave made it extremely difficult to get out.
Abbey Caves. RNZ / Angus Dreaver
The teacher used his body to block part of the flow and lifted any students swept towards him over his shoulder so they could climb out.
The first few got out with ease but the others were struggling to pull themselves up over a large boulder at the entrance, which he described as “near impossible”.
He grabbed one boy and held him up by his overalls to keep his head above water.
“The others were pushing each other under the water and fighting to get on top of the boulder in sheer panic. I yelled at them just to hold onto the rocks and not push each other under … another five or so students then came down the river and basically crashed against me and each other. Many students panicked at the exit and were pulling down on each other as they tried to get their heads above the water.”
By then, the water was up to the teacher’s neck and had started lapping across his face.
He was pushing boys up so students who were already outside the cave could pull them to safety.
One boy was completely underwater with only the top of his helmet showing.
“I tried to reach my arm down to push him but my leg gave way and I was pulled under the water. I tried to find some holds or something to try and pull myself back to the surface but had no luck,” he said.
“I was completely out of breath and thought I was going to die. I tried to calm my mind. I had all kinds of vivid memories coming into my mind from childhood and then a strong image of my wife and children came into view.”
At that point, he saw a gumboot beside him.
“I thought that if I could grab this leg and push off the bottom I may be able to get the student’s head out of the water and in a position where he could be pulled up by others.”
It worked, and he also managed to wedge his foot into a crack and push himself out of the water for a deep breath of air.
“I managed to get both arms out of the water and onto a boulder. At this point I had nothing left in me but I was safe.”
The teacher pulled himself out of the cave, then climbed back in along the wall to rescue two more boys trapped on a ledge.
He said the students were shaken, exhausted and cold, and he was vomiting due to the amount of water he had swallowed.
They gathered partway up the hill to do a headcount and realised Karnin was missing.
“At this point I completely broke down,” he said.
The teacher described himself as “extremely risk averse” and said he did everything in his power to ensure the students were safe given the circumstances.
“What happened on this day has devastated me and shaken me to my core,” he said.
The teacher had since learned that the rainfall intensity reached 30mm per hour after the group entered the cave, far above the 0.5-1.7mm/h forecast that morning.
“I’ve never seen a river in a cave rise like this, even in heavy rainfall.”
The teacher said he had first visited, and fallen in love with, Abbey Caves as a 16-year-old.
That experience had convinced him to pursue a career that would allow him to share his love of the outdoors with others.
He was, however, no longer working in outdoor education, which he found “deeply saddening”.
Trauma was one reason, but another was that he no longer felt he could rely on weather forecasts to keep outdoor activities safe.
“I’ve made the decision to not return to outdoor education, not because I lost my passion for it, but because of the growing unpredictability of extreme weather events,” he said.
“We’re seeing flooding occur with little or no warning, alongside instances where conditions appear safe despite official weather alerts.”
He hoped students would still have opportunities to enjoy the outdoors, but safely, even as the climate changed.
“I’ve always believed that if we don’t see, touch, feel and experience the natural world, we risk losing our connection to it.”
The teacher addressed Karnin’s whānau, saying he hoped the inquest would bring some degree of closure as they continued to “hold tightly to the memories of your beautiful son”.
The teacher gave the court his own list of changes he wanted to see as a result of the tragedy.
They included:
- Clear, standardised EOTC (Education Outside the Classroom) documentation free from ambiguous wording;
- An EOTC coordinator to check all trip documentation on the day, with authority to cancel if justified;
- A single, nationally recognised weather forecaster for outdoor education to ensure consistency and reduce the risk of conflicting information;
- Clear, consistent forecasting, with education for staff on how to accurately interpret weather data;
- Flexibility in schools’ EOTC planning so outdoor education activities can be rescheduled;
- Outdoor education programmes to be led by properly qualified and experienced staff;
- Class sizes and supervision ratios to be standardised and strictly adhered to;
- Clear rules for when EOTC should not go ahead due to weather. For example, an orange rain warning could be an automatic trigger to cancel any water-related activities.
The inquest, before Coroner Alexander Ho in the Whangārei Courthouse, will continue on Tuesday with evidence from the other teacher on the caving trip.
Also due to give evidence this week are a representative of the school’s Board of Trustees and a district council health and safety manager.
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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand