Newspaper Article 1994 – Coastguard grants first ever life membership

Coastguard grants first ever life membership

by Pauline Sutton

A simple “thank you” is something Captain George Gunn says he has rarely heard in more than 30 years of search and rescue work he has done in Hawke’s Bay.

George retired last month from Hawke’s Bay Coastguard and was honoured with its first life membership as well as a certificate of appreciation from Napier Police for his years of advisory work.

He says in all his years of rescue work he has only once received a card from a woman whose husband and father were saved during an operation.

“Some of them abuse you because they say they were alright and didn’t need rescuing and others just take off. We often wonder if it’s because they’re scared they’ll be handed a bill. People can be quite incredible,” he says.

George has been with Hawke’s Bay Coastguard since it came into being in 1986. However, his work in search and rescue goes back to his 28 years with the Napier Harbour Board (he retired as harbour master in 1988) and as a member of the Napier Sailing Club where he sailed a Flying 15.

He can recall Napier’s first stage toward a search and rescue unit when a rocket rescue group was formed in 1961. Although the 2000 yard rocket line was never used, it got the tramping, sailing and surf clubs and the harbour board together for exercises.

Rescues of boats which had broken down or even caught fire were handled through this network.

In the mid-1970s the police set up a close to shore sea and rescue group which handled sea-orientated call-outs until the Hawke’s Bay Volunteer Coastguard was formed in 1986.

Rescues are divided into three classes – class one which are handled by local clubs, class two, where the police become involved with their coastguard advisors and class three “where it gets out of the bounds of the local area and becomes a national concern”.

George says although there may now be fewer rescues than there used to be, too many boats are still going out into Hawke Bay unprepared.

One thing he is “really hot on” is the number of men who take their families out but deny them the chance of either learning to drive the boat or basic rescue procedures.

“Anything happens to him and they’re all in trouble,” he says.

Another “hobby horse” is getting all New Zealand boats registered. “You can’t drive a car or fly an aeroplane if it isn’t registered yet you can go out in any boat,” he says.

“It’s done in Australia, why not here?”

He says technology has made a huge difference in successful search and rescue operations but believes more training is needed for basic boating. Technological advances certainly help but sometimes it’s basic seamanship that’s lacking when people get in trouble.

George learned his skills as a cadet on the Pamir, a Finnish four-masted barque taken over by the New Zealand government during the war and used for training sea cadets.

After that he went to England where he worked for an English tramping company and returned to New Zealand to work on coastal traders until he joined the Napier Harbour Board in 1960.

George comes from a family of mariners. His grandfather, father, two uncles and a brother-in-law all worked at sea and he admits it’s in his blood.

He recently returned from Germany where he and five other New Zealanders attended the 50th World Congress of the Cape Horners’ Association, for those who sailed around Cape Horn.

While he has retired from the Hawke’s Bay Coastguard, his connections with the sea won’t end. He doesn’t sail any more but is still Napier Sailing Club patron and says he’ll still be going out in the club’s rescue boats.

Photo caption – Captain George Gunn is pictured outside the historic Custom House at Ahuriri which he helped refurbish to become Hawke’s Bay Coastguard’s headquarters.