Christmas parade brings joy to Greymouth

The Greymouth community continues to mourn the 29 men who died at Pike River Coal Mine. Photo / Getty Images

A Santa parade in Greymouth today brought out a strong community spirit rising in the face of the tragic deaths of 29 men in the Pike River Mine last month.

Parade organiser Debbie Collings said Greymouth already had a strong community before the tragedy, but it had been strengthened.

This year volunteers had showed up for the parade and carried out their jobs without being reminded, she said.

"With the events of the last couple of weeks the final details had sort of been overlooked, but everyone just remembered it was the Christmas parade, turned up and it was fantastic," she told NZPA.

A good turnout of children and families showed up to watch the 30-35 floats in the parade.

The mood was a bit more subdued than in previous years, but on the whole it was good, Ms Collings said.

There had been talk of cancelling the parade in light of what happened in the mine, but she said it had been the right decision to run it this weekend, when it had always been held.

"Especially after the remembrance service on Thursday - that helps people an awful lot. So this was for the kids... Christmas is their time and really we have to keep moving forward, as hard as that might be."

Organisers had made a conscious decision just to run the normal Christmas parade this year, Ms Collings said.

It was followed by Christmas in the Park.

The first individual remembrance service for the men was held today, that of 23-year-old Michael Monk.

- NZPA