Len Gee, pictured here with his wife Lorna, says he is lucky to have changed travel plans. Photo / Rebecca Mauger
Len Gee, pictured here with his wife Lorna, says he is lucky to have changed travel plans. Photo / Rebecca Mauger
On Christmas Eve 1953, the Wellington–Auckland night express arrived at a bridge damaged by a volcanic lahar. Minutes later it plunged into the flooded Whangaehu River at Tangiwai, 10km west of Waiōuru. Len Gee was meant to be on that train.
“I’ve never felt so lucky in my life.”
When Len Gee was 15 he stayed at his sister’s place in Marton after finishing his year at Wairarapa College. He had decided to go to Rotorua to visit his family for Christmas.
Gee was planning to catch the Wellington–Auckland night express on Christmas Eve. By what he describes as sheer luck, his sister’s neighbour was travelling that way by car the day before the train was set to depart.
“His name was Nick. He had offered to take me home with him. Now I was meant to take the train. I immediately thought ‘What would Mum and Dad think of this?’ The next morning when we woke up and found out about the disaster, Mum and Dad were so relieved I had accepted the ride.”
When Len woke up on Christmas Day in 1953, he says he couldn’t believe the news.
Of the 285 passengers and crew on board, 151 died. It was New Zealand’s worst railway accident and the world’s eighth-deadliest rail disaster at the time. It made headlines around the world.
The nation was stunned, heightened by the timing of the accident on Christmas Eve. New Zealand’s population was just over two million at the time so many people had a direct relationship with someone involved in the tragedy.
The Government’s www.history.govt.nz website details how most of those on the train were heading home for Christmas, armed with presents for friends and family.
“Those waiting to meet their loved ones at the various stations up the line had no sense of the tragedy unfolding on the volcanic plateau. Over the following days, searchers found many battered, mud-soaked presents, toys and teddy bears on the banks of the Whangaehu River.”
Tangiwai means ‘weeping waters’ in Māori.
Most in the locomotive and six carriages which tumbled into the silt and debris-choked Whangaehu River at Tangiwai stood little chance of survival. Photo / NZME
Gee said his brother was listening to the radio.
“I didn’t understand what they were saying. Once he explained it I was shocked. I remember thinking I was going to be on that train.”
A few days later he and his family travelled past the disaster site.
“When I saw the scene I just felt so lucky that I had been offered a car ride. The carriages had nothing left except the frames. We saw one 1km from the initial crash site, it had floated down the river. It was surreal to see the wreckage and know that if things went differently, I may have been a part of it.”
Len now lives in Katikati and said that wasn’t his only near-miss involving trains.
“When I was about 14 at boarding school we were on a rail car. There were cows in the paddock and one of them had jumped the fence onto the railway. The whole train was derailed.”
