Memories of Erebus remain raw

Robyn Dorday's memories of the Erebus disaster, and the grief suffered by her Air New Zealand navigator husband Alan Dorday, are still fresh. Photo / Paul Taylor

Napier woman Robyn Dorday can still remember being in Wellington 38 years ago today, the night when news of the Erebus disaster started filtering through to a shocked nation.

She was listening to the radio and they were playing Rod Stewart's song i>Sailing, while the country awaited any information of Air New Zealand flight TE901, which flew into Mount Erebus killing all 257 people on board.

"To this day whenever I hear that song it reminds of Erebus - I went to work the next day and there were people there who had family affected - it hit everywhere throughout the country."

Another stronger connection, and one she felt compelled to share on this anniversary after years of holding onto the information, was the report compiled by her late husband Alan Dorday, who was working as a navigator and flight planner at Auckland Airport that fateful night.

She said he was a very methodical man who started his shift at 3pm to find out that the plane was missing.

"He said that when he got there were people and reporters everywhere - it was chaos.

"He knew a computer error had been made - he tried to tell his boss - he was so concerned that when his shift finished at 1am he felt he had to write a report."

That report never made it into the hands of Justice Mahon who was charged with investigating the case - rather it only surfaced in the Court of Appeal and Privy Council.

In the report, Mr Dorday outlined the growing concern among his colleagues that the plane had not arrived in Christchurch at the expected time, amid "hectic" activity as news reporters, company personnel and private sector people sought information.

"At approximately 2200 hours I received a call from Mr Aimes of Air New Zealand ... Mr Aimes expressed some concern because he said that some amendments had been made recently to the computer Antarctic flight plans and in relation to this he asked me if I would check the plan for 901," Mr Dorday wrote.

He then compared the co-ordinates to previous flights and found they were all the same except for TE9091/28, which put the plane almost directly in line with Mt Erebus - the co-ordinates for this flight were incorrect for McMurdo.

In his comprehensive exploration of the tragedy, the late Sir Paul Holmes devoted a chapter to Mr Dorday's report in his book, Daughters of Erebus, which was released in 2011, two years after Air New Zealand finally apologised to the families of crash victims over their handling of the crash, two years after Mr Dorday died at the age of 76.

Mrs Dorday said her husband never really got over the experience - he left his job early at the age of 62, and remained disappointed that he was never called to give evidence in the trial.

"He was very unhappy with Air New Zealand - he was invited to receive a 25-year service award but he couldn't go to the event he was still so upset at how the company had let down all the families."

Of those on board, 10 came from Hawke's Bay and she said for their families, as well as everyone else touched by the tragedy, she wanted to make people aware of the report's existence.

"Even 38 years later there is still unresolved business - I feel that the government has still not done enough - it's not sorted out, and I wanted to make it public, this seems like the right time."

She also suggested that maybe there should be a memorial in Hawke's Bay to acknowledge those who lost their lives, to recognise the suffering that had occurred.