KEY POINTS:
A "hero" firefighter is dead and his son seriously injured after a fire truck rolled while racing to a car crash yesterday afternoon.
Ray Barrett was killed on a winding stretch of State Highway 35, north of Gisborne on the rural East Cape. His firefighter son Tahi was airlifted by helicopter to Gisborne Hospital with serious leg injuries. A third firefighter, Sean Murta, escaped unscathed.
The trio, from the Hicks Bay Rural Fire Brigade, were between Hicks Bay and Waihau when the 30-year-old Bedford truck crashed about 4pm.
The 62-year-old, known as "Uncle Ray", died at the scene.
Last night, his widow Joan was too distraught to speak, but her brother Eddie White said Ray was "a true hero. All we know is that they were responding to a car accident on a winding stretch of the main road. He was helping others, that's so typical of him."
One of Ray's fellow firefighters, Annette Chesley, was first on the scene. "I was driving back from Rotorua and I saw it. My partner asked if it was my guys and I knew straight away it was," she said.
"I stopped and got out out. The fire engine was in bits. The top cab was on the road and I couldn't even see the bottom. It was in the ditch.
"My colleague was just standing there and then I saw Tahi and Uncle Ray lying there, pretty much beside each other. Tahi couldn't do anything for his dad." Chesley's partner Dave Heyder started CPR on Ray while she tried to comfort Tahi.
"Tahi was lying there trying to tell him how to do it. He was trying his best to get to his dad but he couldn't. He must have known that was it for his dad."
Ray's sister-in-law was in one of three St John ambulances sent to the scene. Chesley, who said Ray was a like a father to her, left when other emergency services arrived. "I went to his house to see his wife. She wasn't good. They heard something had happened. It was like they were waiting for me to bring the bad news."
Ray joined the Fire Service in Rai Valley in Nelson in the 1970s, before shifting to Turangi, near Taupo, then Hicks Bay in 1989. He and Joan founded the volunteer fire brigade the following year.
"He was most certainly a loyal servant of the people," said White.
The owner-operator of Coastline Couriers, Ray drove his truck up to 12 hours a day and also volunteered as a senior ambulance officer for St John.
"This is a little insight into how dedicated he was to helping other people," White.
"He would do a 12-hour run to Gisborne and back, the pager would go off and he would help all night. He was 62 but you wouldn't believe he was a day over 40."
Ray also had a daughter, Tania, and four grandchildren, all of whom are involved in emergency services in the East Cape.
He loved to play the guitar and bass, as well as being a "fixer-upper" of cars. "We're all one family," said White. "He's going to be very sadly missed. We're all devastated."
Last night, emergency services were still at the scene as the police Serious Crash Unit began their investigations.
"We don't know whether it was driver fault, road fault or vehicle fault. We have no idea at this stage," said Inspector Marty Parker.
The truck is owned by the Gisborne District Council as part of the Eastern Regional Rural Fire Committee.
It passed its latest Certificate of Fitness in October and has just 20,000km on the clock.
