And you pay this poser $0.5m or more?

It is now almost a week into the tragedy at the mount.

And the overpaid tosser that poses as your Mayor today finally admits that council staff were indeed on site but did nothing.

there were some council staff at the Mount Maunganui campground when the deadly landslide occurred.

At this stage, he said he was not sure exactly who was where, but he was committed to getting answers and learning from the tragedy.

Drysdale also confirmed council received a call from Fire and Emergency New Zealand at 5.51am on the morning of the slip, but said he "didn't have all the details yet".

FFS, what has this overpaid PoS been doing for the past 6 days?  Looking good, being 'seen to be doing something' at multiple press stand-ups.  All the while effectively doing nothing like taking a scalpel to his organisation to find out some real information as one might have expected.  Six days is more than long enough to find out who was where.

Stop drip-feeding information, name those involved, their actions with timelines.  And those in the frame with the decisions made at that time for the tree removals.  

Unfortunately a shitload of whitewash is heading to the inquiry, we know the council wallahs will be arse-covering and nobody will assume responsibility.  Or end up in jail.  There'll be something in the treaty against the owners of The Mount being responsible.

ps.  I do wonder why Caterpillar (or others) have not supplied long stick machines with an extreme reach.  These long reach sticks could retrieve slip materials from a safer distance lessening the chance of placing the machine in harm's way.  No, the jobsworth's have the site screwed down tighter than Luxon's chances of re-election.  

Meanwhile in the Indonesian slip in recent days with many more fatalities have people crawling all over their active slip site without a safety cone in sight!

pps.  I see the other slip is growing at Papamoa.  Apparently it could now affect the marae.  Let's see  how much taxpayer money is thrown at that problem?

 

Heroes and others.

As we watch the landslip at Mt. Maunganui unfolding before our very eyes, unfortunately the outcomes appear to be worsening toward tragedy with every passing hour.

Already we are hearing of brave heroes that acted immediately when the initial damage occurred occurred in the early daylight hours.  A lady who herself reportedly was warning others may now be a victim.  Also a couple of passing builders on their way to work who grabbed their tools and started opening the landslide shattered toilet block roof with cordless drills.

Then we have the fire and police services.  Arrived on site "some decent time later", according to a passing jogger.  One of the builders (sans footwear) was back at his van for tinsnips to cut the roof mesh.  Risk-averse Mr. Plod / Fire Brigade intervened.  No safety shoes, you're not going back on-site to help.  FFS, they had the tools there and from the sound of it already had lifted some roofing iron!

Then the Minister of Mr. Plod has turned up  .  The Minister needs elocution lessons.  He gave a speech from the throne full of "umms" and "aaahs" on what we already know, trying to spin "it's still a rescue mission".  Other wankers like the Commissioner of Mr. Plod and the Mayor are in the frame for a must have "seen to be doing something" certificate as they continue turning up on-site.  Even the Prime Manager of New Zealand is due to show his managerial skills later today.

And today, just over 35 hours in, we have the local racists who now have the ultimate excuse to permanently shut The Mount.  No doubt somewhere there will be loud calls "it's in the treaty!".  They've been on the "shut The Mount" hobby-horse for years "for our people".  Now watch the wailing will rise to fever-pitch as their potential prime source of grift has been supposedly damaged by the colonials.  

As I said in the title, thank God there are always selfless heroes who are willing to confront danger head on.  

And then there are others.

Metservice fails on cue

A big rain event is about to dump on New Zealand this morning.

Rightly so everyone is looking at Metservice for real time info.

And right on cue, the Metservice website fails under load. (reports here)

Reminds me of those scary words "We are from the government and are here to help."