Ōmokoroa fire chief Ian Blunt has spent more than four decades answering the call – from fatal crashes to house fires, saving people and animals, and medical emergencies.

Now, that lifetime of service has been recognised with a King’s Service Medal.

Blunt, 75, said the award left him stunned.

“I thought to myself, ‘wow’, and ‘oh crikey’. That someone would nominate me for this prestigious award was not something I’d ever thought about.

“I’m absolutely humbled, excited and proud, but I didn’t join the fire service for accolades. It’s always about helping people, and that’s been my catchcry from day one.”

Blunt said he joined the Ōmokoroa Volunteer Fire Brigade on October 9, 1984 – a time when there were two fire trucks, “not many feet on the ground”, and the firefighters attended about 15 callouts a year.

“I recall two days later sitting in the back of the fire truck, shivering and shaking, as we headed to what ended up being a fatal car crash on the infamous Apata Curves between Katikati and Ōmokoroa.”

He said his interest in the fire service was first sparked at age 15 by his late mother Ivy’s passion for chasing fire trucks around Waihī.

“My mother didn’t have a driving licence, but I did, so when she heard the siren go off, or we could see smoke and flames, I’d drive her to the scene.”

Blunt rose quickly through the ranks, becoming station officer in 1988, serving a decade as deputy chief, and taking over as chief fire officer in 2002.

In 2015, he helped establish New Zealand’s first dedicated Medical First Response Unit, separating medical responders from firefighting crews – an innovation recognised nationally.

Today, he said, the brigade attended about 100 fire and crash-related callouts and also hundreds of medical incidents a year – last year the firefighters responded to 370 medical events.

Blunt’s leadership has helped strengthen ties between Fire and Emergency NZ, St John, Coastguard and other Bay of Plenty organisations, while securing funding for equipment and resources for the brigade.

Beyond firefighting, Blunt is a long-standing member, chairman and course superintendent of the Ōmokoroa Golf Club, the commodore of the Ōmokoroa Boat Club and is involved in the Ōmokoroa Point School’s fundraising efforts.

He said he had no plans to retire from the fire service just yet, as he was driven by the rewards of helping save lives and property.

“It’s really cool when you can save someone’s home by blasting heaps of water on to a kitchen fire, and rescue a horse bogged down in the Mangawhai Creek estuary with the tide coming in. It gives me great joy.”

He thanked his wife, Doreen, for her “incredible patience and unwavering support”, and his brigade teammates for their dedication to keeping the community safe.

Sandra Conchie is a senior journalist at the Bay of Plenty Times and Rotorua Daily Post who has been a journalist for 25 years. She mainly covers police, court and other justice stories, as well as general news. She has been a Canon Media Awards regional/community reporter of the year.