Lake Ōhau fire: a heroic couple went through the village banging on doors after seeing a fire

From Checkpoint, RNZ

Viv Smith-Campbell, a resident of Ōhau, still has bruised knuckles from banging on the doors, urging residents and visitors to leave as flames crept into the small village in the middle of the night.

She and her husband Louis are believed to be the first to raise the alarm. Call 111 on Viv’s cell phone is timestamped at 3.06am on Sunday.

A howling wind, pebbles falling on his tin roof, and his elderly border collie in need of an early morning pit stop likely saved their lives, and the lives of others, from the wildfire that destroyed 40 properties.

Louis, restless after returning to bed after taking the dog out, saw the fire through his bedroom loft window.

Viv Smith-Campbell, who has visited Ōhau for 30 years and has lived permanently in what she calls paradise for the past five years, says she and her husband always had a plan.

“We have a dog, her name is Hebe. She is a 13 year old border collie, she is a dog. And she has to get up and pee at night,” Viv told RNZ.

“So my husband had taken her out to urinate around 2 in the morning and came back in and couldn’t go back to sleep. And just before three, he looked out our loft window and saw something. The full moon had out he thought, he couldn’t believe it, he thought ‘no, that can’t be fire’, he looked away, looked again and realized that yes, so he woke me up.

“The town had a plan for what to do in case of fires and Louis, my husband and I had a plan.

And so, at three in the morning, he got off the ground. Louis got in our car and drove through town honking his horn and yelling at the fire siren. [He] He turned it on and continued to circle around the village, continued to knock and shout.

“So my job was to dial 111, which I did, I was the first to call, my cell phone tells me it was 3.06 am.

“A lovely man on the other end of the line, asked me to describe how big the fire was, he said, ‘Is it the size of a football field?’ I said, ‘It’s actually two football fields now.’ .

“And then I said, ‘No, it’s three football fields,’ and I think I got to four.

“We know that the fire service comes from Omarama or Twizel, and it takes between 30 and 40 minutes to arrive.”

Viv said her husband Louis returned and had seen several houses that did not appear to have been awakened.

“There are many vacationers in the village, many rented houses. So I got in the car and started playing and driving and stopping at houses and waking people up.

“It’s down now, but my knuckles were bruised from knocking on doors.”

He told people not to pack, urging them to get in the car and drive away, which they did.

“There was a whole group of young people, staff from the ski slope, running, I told them to get in the vehicles and leave and they did.

“When we left, we lived on the western side of the village, I could feel the heat, smell it and hear it. The fire was right there.

“I don’t know how long this all took. It seemed to take quite a while. Talking to people may have only taken 10 minutes, I don’t know. But there were a lot of cars in front of us, we weren’t the last to leave, but we were near the end. .

“But I’ll say it again, it’s so important that people think about what you think is unthinkable.

“We have always known that in Ōhau there are many wild pines and in Pukaki we learned what happens with them, and we knew that if we didn’t help each other, no one else would. There would be no fire people Knocking on doors, we had to go out, and that was what knew the community that lived there.

“I wasn’t the only one knocking on doors, there were other people knocking on doors, a lot of people, the residents who made sure the visitors got out. So Louis and I are not the people who did it. We did what we had. what to do and other people did what they had to do and as a community we got everyone out.

“I’m proud of that, but I’m proud that people followed the plan, did what they had to do, and came out,” Viv said.

Having the evacuation plan has always been comforting, he said.

“The Waitaki District Council set the Civil Defense siren because you know we have earthquake fires, whatever, we have dangers.

“Fire Emergency NZ, they used to come every summer and we have little fire suppression hoses around town, and they would tell us about it and go over the plan with us and tell us to just get out.

“I can’t speak highly of the firefighters, they are heroes, we left the village but they came in and defended people’s houses, they saved our house. All the houses around us are gone and they saved our house. It’s incredible that they did.

“And they are still doing it. And it’s dangerous, dirty, exhausting and horrible work, but they are wonderful, wonderful people.

“Everyone involved, my admiration for them is so high. I didn’t think I’d see our house again. I thought I’d disappear. But Louis and I have our beautiful three little cabins. I work from home in one of them, and Louis does. does, and we live in the other.

“We talked to a local firefighter about it, that they did it to save him is heroic, just heroic.

“It’s property after all, it’s things, you know, we weren’t there, they weren’t saving us, they were saving things that were important and our house, and they were taking risks doing it.”

– RNZ