From Greymouth to São Paulo’s slums, Roy Arbon’s adventure ends in kidnap and imprisonment on foreign soil leaving him facing life behind bars. Uncovering every twist and turn of his riches-to-rags ride, does he really understand how close he came to catastrophe? Made with funding from NZ on Air.
A former Erebus disaster recovery worker and one-time accidental international drug smuggler is still missing this morning after setting off on a solo day tramp northeast of Greymouth on Wednesday.
The alarm was raised on Thursday after 75-year-old Roy Arbon failed to return from a walk up Mt Davy toMt Sewell the day before.
Searches have been under way since, and police search and rescue teams – alongside LandSAR volunteers from Greymouth and surrounding areas – would resume their efforts this morning, police said.
“Teams on the ground will continue to receive support from above, with helicopters assisting with search efforts.”
Anyone with information that could help should contact police via 105, either over the phone or online, police said.
Police are appealing for sightings of 75-year-old Roy after he failed to return from a walk from Mt Davy to Mt Sewell, northeast of Greymouth, on Wednesday. Image / Supplied
The Ōtira-based pensioner and beekeeper was well known on the West Coast, but also for his remarkable life story.
He spent 18 months in an Australian prison before a jury found him not guilty of knowingly trafficking drugs.
Body recovery workers pictured by the wrecked fuselage of Air New Zealand flight TE901 at the site of the 1979 Erebus disaster in Antarctica.
A former alpine climber, Arbon once worked on North Sea oil rigs, served in Antarctica and was part of the grim recovery efforts after an Air New Zealand Antarctic sightseeing flight crashed into Mt Erebus in 1979, killing all 257 people on board.
Arbon also responded after the Cave Creek disaster, winning commendations for his work recovering the dead after the West Coast DoC platform collapsed into a ravine.
He was also once locked up briefly in a Kenyan jail for accidentally breaking a train window, and survived a serious fall from scaffolding that broke his back, preventing him from joining a Himalayan expedition, in which he was replaced by mountaineer Rob Hall.
Roy Arbon spent time in an Australian jail last decade before a jury acquitted him on charges of drug smuggling.
Arbon previously told the Herald his drug smuggling experience and trial were “pretty harrowing”.
“In total, I probably lost close to half a million. But it’s only money, I’m still alive. Money is meant to be spent.”
Despite what he’d been through, he still tried to see the best in people.
“The Lord trusted Judas. If you can’t trust people, you might as well die.”
