The efforts of the first member of the Wanaka-based search and rescue team to arrive at the Motatapu Gorge, near Wanaka, on New Year's Day, 2012, to assist a teenager trapped between two rocks, was also acknowledged yesterday.
Senior Constable Mike Johnston made several attempts to free 15-year-old Dion Latta, who was trapped under a waterfall with his leg caught between two rocks.
The rescue effort resulted in Otago-Southland coroner David Crerar referring six people to the Royal Humane Society of New Zealand for awards, including Snr Const Johnston, who was presented with the society's Silver Medal by the Governor-General, Sir Jerry Mateparae, at Government House yesterday.
Snr Const Johnston, a member of the Wanaka police search and rescue squad and a leader in the LandSAR Wanaka swift-water rescue team, swam and climbed up the gorge to where he could see Dion's foot sticking out of the water.
He climbed into the pool of water above where the teenager was trapped and made several attempts to reach his foot, but was prevented by the strong current. He then tried to reach it by lying across a rock above the waterfall, but the current caused him to slip down the face of the rock and into the 1.5m-deep pool of turbulent water below the waterfall.
He climbed back and, taking hold of Dion's hand, attempted to pull him to the side and out of the flow of the waterfall, but was unable to move him.
Several members of the alpine cliff rescue team arrived and, while Snr Const Johnston blocked the flow of water, they attached slings to Dion's foot and wrist and got him out.
Dion was airlifted to Dunedin Hospital, but died the next day of ''immersion hypothermia'', Mr Crerar found.
