Mourners leave the mass grave of those killed in the 1967 mining disaster at Strongman. Photo / NZ Herald
Alice Noble knows exactly what she would say to the vandals who wrecked a memorial to her late husband and other victims of one of New Zealand's worst mining disasters.
"What I would like to say face to face to them is: If their father had been killed and buried,
would they have done it? And what would they think of somebody who did?"
Vandals used rocks to smash a memorial plaque that remembers the 19 men who died in an underground explosion in the Strongman Mine on the South Island's West Coast on January 19, 1967.
The plaque will now have to be replaced. Those responsible for the damage are still to be caught.
Mrs Noble, whose husband Eric "Gint" Newcombe died in the disaster, said it was hard to put into words her feelings over the vandalism.
"It's beyond comprehension. I suppose, like a lot of people, we are presuming it's young people that have done it ... I can't think of an adult even thinking of it. And they could have been out of their minds."
Constable Rose Green, of the Greymouth police, said it was hard to fathom why the "clowns" would have damaged a memorial to a tragedy that "touched everyone" on the West Coast.
"I imagine whoever's done it will want to keep it to themselves. Because the last thing they will want is some burly miner throttling them."
Mrs Noble would like to see the vandals "taken down a mine".
"Let the current miners deal with them," she said. "I'm sure they will think of some way of getting it through to them just what they have done."
Although the tragedy was more than 40 years ago, Mrs Noble said the loss never went away.
Mining company Solid Energy has offered to pay the few thousand dollars to replace the damaged plaque, but the West Coast mining community has also offered to contribute.
