THE LONGEST DAY

Pulling a fire truck through the city centre on Saturday was the last of a morning of gut-busting activities for Gisborne Intermediate School students. Picture by Mark Peters

by Andrew Ashton

A group of Gisborne Intermediate  School students impressed onlookers in Gisborne on Saturday as they pulled a fire truck through the city centre.

About 25 pupils aged 11 and 12 took part in the challenge, which was the culmination of 10 weeks of pre-dawn training sessions through the Atawhai youth mentoring programme.

Atawhai is a programme of physical training developed from the armed forces programme. It is designed to extend a young person’s mind and physical capability.

The 10-week course comprises three one-hour training sessions per week, of progressively harder physical routines, finishing with a graduation day aptly named The Longest Day. This year that finished with participants pulling a fire truck from Gisborne Police Station to the Fire Station in Palmerston Road.

This was after they had completed  a log carry, followed by a stores carry involving carrying sandbags, Jerry cans, medicine balls and ropes, and negotiated a firefighter’s obstacle course, all from a 6am start.

Lead instructor Kumeroa Papuni-Tuhaka said he was “really proud” of both the group and  the instructors.

“The Longest Day period is the culmination of that 10 weeks. They were under that log for at least two hours, carry logs for 4.5km. That’s something adults wouldn’t even put themselves through.

“Essentially we covered 20km-25km, which again is something not a lot of people would do.”

The activities took a total of six and a half hours.

The children were carefully monitored for safety.

Mr Papuni-Tuhaka said this year was the first time the programme had run since Covid-19 arrived in 2020.