Dear Fire and Emergency New Zealand,

As detailed in the 2019/20 Annual Report, FENZ was involved in the response to the Whakaari/White Island disaster in December 2019. Under the provisions of the Official Information Act I request the following information relating to FENZ’s response:

1. As one of the emergency services involved in the response, please advise who was the Lead Agency that was responsible for the overall management of the incident and assigned and managed the tasks that Fire and Emergency NZ undertook?

Note: multi-agency responses in NZ are mandated to be managed using the Coordinated Incident Management System (CIMS) which requires a Lead Agency to be assigned.

2. Please identify what functional roles FENZ personnel were assigned to in the Lead Agency's Incident Management Team (IMT) that was established to manage the response to the Whakaari disaster and specifically to the rescue/recovery operations that followed the first day of the incident (the 9th Dec).

3. FENZ’s own Command and Control procedures specify that FENZ will complete an Incident Action Plan (IAP) which it then gives to the Lead Agency’s IC to be included in the overall IAP for the incident (ref Two levels of Planning 2.5.3 and 2.5.4). Please provide copies of the IAPs that FENZ produced for Whakaari and which were included in the Lead Agency’s daily IAPs.

4. Please provide copies of the daily Whakaari IAPs that identify the tasks as assigned to FENZ resources by the Lead Agency’s Incident Management Team (IMT) and as signed off by the Incident Controller (IC).

Yours faithfully,

Alan Thompson

Dear FENZ,

It is very disappointing that you will not provide the information as requested within the 20 working days as required under the Act. These are simple questions that need only a brief answer from records/information that you hold. There is no reason that you should pass this request to another agency, it is specifically about FENZ and information that you hold.

It is inevitable that your delay is seen to simply mean that you are deliberately setting out to frustrate my request for this information. I regret that you find it necessary to play these sorts of games and make this process much more difficult and time consuming than it needs to be.

I will however take your advice and lodge a complaint with the Office of the Ombudsman given this quite unreasonable delay in providing such simple and readily available information.,

Alan Thompson

Dear Ms Bleakley

Thank you for the information requested on FENZ’s role in the Whakaari/White Island eruption response. I will be using this information in my submission to the Chief Coroner and also to support my Petition to Parliament for an inquiry into the response. I do however note some inconsistencies within the information provided and so I would like to set out my understanding of your response. In the event that I have mis-understood or mis-interpreted your information I invite you to provide any further clarification.

1. FENZ were tasked by and worked under the management of Bay of Plenty CD&EM Group who you advised were the overall Lead Agency for the response. (Ref your response to my Item 1).

I note that both the NCC SITREP and the USAR SITREP state that they were supporting NEMA’s response to White Island. I presume this was simply an error on their part and they both meant to refer to “BOPCD&EMG”.

2. FENZ personnel were assigned to the role of Liaison Officer in the Incident Management Team at the EOC that Bay of Plenty CD&EG Group set up and who you advised were in overall Command and Control (ie the Lead Agency) of the incident response. (Ref your response to my Item 2).

I note that the NCC SITREP (Page 4) states that FENZ had an Operations Manager in “the EOC” which is not consistent with the advice but assume this is an error in the SITREP.

3. FENZ did not prepare a daily Incident Action Plan as prescribed in your own Command and Control written procedures (2.5.3 and 2.5.4) for inclusion in the IMT’s IAP. (Ref your response to my item 3).

4. FENZ was not included in any daily IAP taskings as prepared by the BOP CD&EM Group IMT and/or you have no record of any IAP or Tasking as assigned to FENZ resources by this IMT. FENZ was not operating under the Operation structure of the CIMS model as implemented by BOPCD&EMG or any written Incident Action Plan prepared and issued by the Incident Controller on behalf of the Lead Agency. (Ref your response to my Item 4 and 1 above).

Yours sincerely,

Alan Thompson