Fire in Weston? Chances are a member of the Koppert family will be fighting it. North Otago reporter Rebecca Ryan reports on one family's dedication to their community.
In 1973, five Weston men formed a committee in a bid to get a local fire brigade in the town.
Bevan Koppert, who has been responding to callouts since the Weston Volunteer Fire Brigade was formed that year, was part of that committee.
These days his daughter, son-in-law and grandson all join him as volunteers for the brigade and his son is a career firefighter in Invercargill.
Between them, they have contributed 96 years of time to the New Zealand Fire Service.
It all started after a house caught fire in Weston township in the early 1970s.
Oamaru had the nearest fire brigade, and it duly attended, but Bevan Koppert and others in the Weston community felt it was time Weston had its own outfit.
After several meetings with the Waitaki County Council and the Oamaru Fire Brigade, a section of land on Weston's Main St was bought and a fully operational volunteer fire brigade began as a suburban branch of the Oamaru brigade.
It was given an old fire engine from Oamaru and an old coal shed refurbished to house it.
Nine or 10 people responded to a call for volunteers and Weston was recognised as a brigade in its own right.
''And it's just steadily grown since then,'' Mr Koppert said.
This year is his 42nd with the brigade and he has been chief fire officer for 20 years.
In his spare time he works as a vehicle inspector.
In that time he has seen many devastating fires, including the fire which destroyed The Warehouse in Oamaru's Thames St in 1995 and fires at the Pukeuri Freezing Works in 2006 and Teschemakers in 2003.
''I could just about take you minute for minute through that [Teschemakers fire] still.
''It was big, really big.''
In a small community, the firefighters often knew the victims of fires and crashes, or their families.
Years ago, Mr Koppert attended a fire that claimed the life of his best friends' niece and earlier this year, he was called to a workplace accident where a friend of 40 years was killed.
''It's just one of those things. You chew it over - it's hard chewing.''
Each volunteer dealt with distressing situations differently and a lot of assistance was available for that now.
A lot had changed in 42 years.
''Technology is so more advanced than when we first started. Everything - the equipment, the firefighting kit that we wear ... the trucks and everything, it's all completely different.''
The Weston brigade averaged about 100 callouts a year, to car crashes, fires and a growing number of medical emergencies.
Weston also provides back-up to the Oamaru brigade, and vice-versa.
''It goes both ways. We back up to Kakanui, to Hampden, to Duntroon - it's a fair area of coverage.''
Firefighting runs in the Koppert family. Twenty-five years ago, Mr Koppert's son-in-law, Geoff Parsons, volunteered for the Weston Brigade.
Mr Koppert's son, Greg, joined 23 years ago, spending eight years with the Weston brigade before applying to become a career firefighter.
He has spent the past 15 years with the Invercargill Fire Brigade, and is now a station officer.
The jump from volunteer to career firefighter was quite large, he said.
''But I think it's probably one of the best careers in the world.
''Probably the thing that excites me about this job is you go to work with a small amount of stuff you know you're doing, but a large amount you don't really know what's going to happen.''
Earlier this year, Bevan Koppert's grandson, Nick Parsons, passed his seven-day recruit training in Dunedin and took an active role in the Weston Volunteer Brigade.
Mr Koppert's daughter, Terrie Parsons, Geoff's wife, also volunteered with Weston, and had spent the past six years as a volunteer business support worker.
She does most of the administration for the brigade, logging records, fire calls and training calls, as well as providing food for volunteers on bigger jobs.
It had been bred into her that ''when the fire siren went, if we were going somewhere, well that was tough, we stayed at home, or Dad wasn't coming'', she said.
One year, Mr Koppert missed the celebration of his wedding anniversary, leaving his wife, family and friends waiting at the restaurant while he was called to an emergency.
Mr Koppert put his long service down to the camaraderie of the Weston brigade.
''And really, in all fairness to everybody, it is actually a service to our community and we're big on that.''
In the high winds in October, the calls were coming in one after another, and the jobs were getting bigger and bigger.
''I left work on the Tuesday just after lunch and I returned to work on Thursday afternoon.''
At the back of the station, they found a box of refreshments with a note that read: ''Heard your siren going a lot over the past few days; thought you might be thirsty''.
''That was brilliant - because we never went to their place. They just obviously heard the siren going and thought, ` ... these fellas are on the run'.''
