Erebus captain's daughter says memorial belongs in Auckland
The eldest daughter of the Erebus captain says she's grateful to Christchurch for offering to host a memorial, but still believes the national memorial should be in Auckland.
On Wednesday, the Ministry of Culture and Heritage announced three possible Christchurch locations for an Erebus memorial site have been shared with families.
The sites will honour the 257 people who lost their lives in 1979 when Flight TE901 crashed into the slopes of Mt Erebus in Antarctica while on a sight-seeing tour.
An earlier plan for the memorial to be built at a park in Auckland city's fringe suburb of Parnell triggered opposition from several groups - including people who feared for the health of a pōhutukawa and others who worried it would change the tone of the park.
The plan was abandoned in 2023 after storm damage made it unsafe to build on the site.
Photo: Colin Monteith / Antarctica New Zealand Pictorial Collection
Kathryn Carter, the eldest daughter of the late Erebus captain Jim Collins, said she wanted to see Auckland "take ownership" for the national memorial, which is long overdue.
She said it was generous for Christchurch City to offer to host the memorial, but believed Auckland was most suitable for it - as the home city for a significant number of passengers and crew members on board Erebus.
Carter said that sentiment was shared among many of the family members of victims whom she had kept in touch with over the years.
Auckland was where the flight departed and the city would be the best place for the memorial to celebrate Erebus passengers' "journey into the unknown" and to celebrate their lives, Carter said.
She said Auckland, as the main hub in New Zealand, would also be the most convenient place for the family of the victims across the country and the world to come and pay tribute.
Carter said "the whole of NZ is involved in the loss" and added that it was frustrating that there was still no national memorial decades after the disaster.
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