Wife dies in her husband’s arms in Christmas Eve accident

Otto Lijzenga and his wife Kana Hirose were biking through the Spooners Range on Christmas Eve when a hanging branch in the middle of the track divided their paths forever.

Lijzenga went under the branch. Hirose went to the side on loose gravel and 30 minutes later he was dead.

A freak accident saw Blenheim’s 50-year-old woman suffer a ruptured liver after falling and being struck in her abdomen by the bicycle handlebars.

Lijzenga desperately tried to call for medical assistance around 10 a.m. amid poor reception in the dense terrain 40 kilometers southwest of Nelson. He also administered CPR to the best of his ability.

“She was in a lot of pain so I thought, what can I do? I can’t leave her here, but I need help at the same time. I talked to her about it, I said ‘I can’t leave you unstable,'” Lijzenga said.

“Two other riders showed up and tried to make her feel comfortable at first, but she soon lost consciousness.”

They gave him cardiopulmonary resuscitation for 30 minutes, until the rescue helicopter arrived.

Nelson Marlborough rescue helicopter pilot Euan Stratford led paramedics to the scene a kilometer below the Spooners tunnel and said a closed door prevented ambulances from reaching the scene.

“Everything happened reasonably quickly. Once we flew overhead, we saw people doing CPR and we thought that was not good,” Stratford said.

“Everyone knows her as the kindest, friendliest and most loving person in the world,” Otto Lijzenga says of his wife Kana Hirose, pictured. Photo / Supplied

A paramedic got out and the helicopter landed 500 meters away, but it was too late.

“In hindsight, she left after about half an hour. We still tried CPR, but she was really gone. But she was pronounced dead half an hour later. [paramedics arrived]”Lijzenga said.

“Then I sat down with the body and really cried, I cried for his spirit.

“I had a great release on the spot the moment she died, from [her] pain and my own pain. I am sorry for those who were there, I felt a lot of pain on my part. “

The 57-year-old financial advisor and his wife Hirose, a massage therapist, were on a four-day trail along Tasman Bay and in the Spooners Range.

They were on the last day of the trip from Tapawera to Nelson when the tragedy occurred.

Lijzenga said there was nothing dangerous about the “well groomed trail”.

The couple had been together for six years, after meeting on a walk in Auckland.

“We love the outdoors, the love of spirituality binds us deeply. We treasure every second we were together,” Lijzenga said.

“It’s a very deep and deep love for each other. Walking, biking, being outdoors and being together. It didn’t really matter what we did as long as we were together, we were happy.”

The couple had two sons from previous relationships, both 24 years old and daughters 21 years old. They all live in Auckland.

Lijzenga spent Christmas Day and the days after planning his wife’s funeral and other monuments. The couple had planned to spend Christmas together in Momorangi Bay.

“As soon as I got out of the forest, I called my son and he flew in from Auckland in six hours,” Lijzenga said.

“The feeling of loss, of course, is terrible … witnessing it was very traumatic.

“There are friends with me. Their children will arrive on January 6.”

A ceremony at the couple’s home in Blenheim with all of the couple’s children will take place on January 8 and Hirose will be cremated. A celebration of his life will follow on January 9.

Lijzenga will be away from work for two months, in which time he plans to go on a solitary retreat near the coast.

“I will meditate and pray, and I will work to process what happened, because there are so many people during the first two weeks. [after Hirose’s death]”Lijzenga said.

“So I need time alone to regain my inner strength again.”

He says he will also travel to Wellington to join the other two riders who helped Hirose’s final moments on the Great Taste trail.

Lijzenga says she wants to “meet with her two families and communicate with them because they have been through a traumatic experience with me.”

He also plans to plant a tree in memory of Hirose at a ceremony in Auckland with his children.

Both Lijzenga and Hirose immigrated to New Zealand more than 20 years ago, Lijzenga from the Netherlands and Hirose from Japan.

He says that “the word that sums up Kana would precisely be sweet.”

“Everyone knows her as the kindest, friendliest and most loving person in the world.”