'We’re not going to burn in here': One-armed grandfather rescues family from house fire

Flames were already tearing through 68-year-old Hirini Tau’s home when he woke. 

With only one arm, he pulled his unconscious son down a smoke-filled hallway to safety. 

“I just wanted to turn it into something that could save lives,” he said of sharing his story. 

Hirini Tau woke around 1am on June 11. He wasn’t sure what roused him, but heard something popping. 

He opened his bedroom door and peered down the hallway, where the lounge was overrun by flames. 

“I stared in the eyes of the devil. That’s what it looked like to me,” he said. 

Tau said it was like a whirlwind. 

“It was just terrible, ugly.” 

As he stared at the inferno, he thought: “not today”. 

Thick black smoke rushed down the passageway. Tau inhaled hot fumes and fell to the floor. 

“I was coughing and choking,” he said. 

Tau crawled through the smoke-filled dark to his son Clayton, who was sleeping in the room next to the lounge. 

Fearing his family would die if he were to pass out in the smoke, he stayed low. 

“I shook him, and I said, ‘Son, get up, the house is on fire’,” Tau said. 

Forty-year-old Clayton sat up, jumped out of bed and in a half-asleep state unknowingly rushed straight towards the fire. 

“I was trying to yell out to him, ‘Not that way, not that way’,” Tau said. 

Flames were spreading through the hallway, burning red, orange, purple and blue. 

The force of the blaze knocked Clayton back, leaving him unconscious. 

Tau, who lost his left arm in a 1984 accident, grabbed Clayton by the belt and dragged him down the hallway to his grandchildren’s bedroom, quickly shutting the door behind him. 

Inside, 13-year-old Te Ariki Tohia Harris and 11-year-old Paeroa Harris were still asleep. 

It was dark. Smoke had seeped into the room when the door had opened. 

With the fire closing in, their only escape was a window – the lower half fixed, the top opening outwards. 

Tau used all his strength to pull Te Ariki Tohia up towards the window’s opening before pushing him through. 

He then felt for Paeroa, worried for a brief moment that she wasn’t in her bed. But she was there. He pulled her up too, again pushing her through the window. 

With the grandchildren safely outside the home, Tau turned to his son. Clayton had come to but was disoriented and coughing. 

Hirini Tau with his wife Paeroa (centre), granddaughter Paeroa Harris and grandson Te Ariki Tohia Harri amid the remains of their home. Photo / Jason Dorday 

Far North grandfather Hirini Tau saved his two grandchildren and son from a fire early on June 11 by pushing them out a window. Photo / Jason Dorday 

He pleaded for Clayton to get up, telling him the fire was coming. 

" ... We’re not going to burn in here,” Tau told his son. 

Clayton said he was weak and sore. 

But Tau told him: “You have to dig deep boy and get up.” 

Tau sat Clayton on the bed under the window. 

He took a deep breath, then helped push his son up and out, though his arms got caught. 

Tau pushed his son’s legs, until he fell to the ground outside. 

With everyone out, the grandfather made his own escape. He stood on the bed and swung his leg out the window, but got no further as the other leg jammed against the wall inside. 

From outside, Te Ariki Tohia grabbed Tau’s leg. 

“...I said ‘Pull it, even if it breaks, it’s all right’. So he pulled it hard, my leg popped out, and I just slipped out the window.” 

As soon as his feet hit the ground the “whole room erupted into fire”. 

The far right bedroom is where Hirini Tau managed to haul his two grandchildren and son out the window early on June 11. Photo / Jason Dorday 

The shocked group stood in 3C temperatures, wearing the T-shirts they had been sleeping in, watching their home burn. 

“All types of noises” broke the early morning silence. They could hear glass smash and creaking as corrugated iron lifted. 

“I’ve never ever experienced a fire like it before,” Tau said. 

His only thought was “Thank God we’re out”. 

Paeroa wasn’t home when the blaze broke out. After an urgent call from her daughter, she rushed to Moerewa to meet her son, who took her home. 

She had no idea if the rest of her family were safe. 

When her son pulled down the driveway, the realisation of what was happening hit her. 

“I just broke down outside,” she said. 

Paeroa Tau stares at the wrecked remains of her family home of more than 30 years. Photo / Jason Dorday 

All four family members escaped with minor injuries. 

Kaikohe fire chief Bill Hutchinson, who was one of the 25 Far North volunteer firefighters sent to help, said the family had come “so close” to dying. 

A neighbour had seen the fire and called for help, but the home and everything inside couldn’t be saved. 

Tau and his wife Paeroa were devastated to lose precious heirlooms, photographs, and Tau’s research into his whakapapa. 

Paeroa and Hirini had moved the house from Moerewa to their Kaikohe farm 30 years ago. 

Since then, the home had been the backdrop to countless family memories, with their 54 grandchildren and 15 great-grandchildren often staying. 

Fire investigator Graeme Matthews said the fire was caused by an electrical fault and had started in the corner of the lounge. 

Tau wanted his story to help save lives. 

He hoped to use his experience to develop a fire safety programme. 

He believed every home should have an exit away from fireplaces and kitchens, especially considering his son had run towards the known main exit. 

Far North grandfather Hirini Tau wants to use his story to help save the lives of others. Photo / Jason Dorday

As Tau surveyed the damage on Tuesday, there were blackened heaps of burned clothing. Several metres away, a lemon tree stood with scorched leaves. 

The singed pages of books lay open, one showed the face of a kuia with a moko kauae. 

Tau felt the family had survived partly because of a connection to their ancestors and Atua [God]. 

“ ... I believe in that sort of thing,” he said. 

Brodie Stone covers crime and emergency for the Northern Advocate. She has spent most of her life in Whangārei and is passionate about delving into issues that matter to Northlanders and beyond.