Cave Creek Memorial
At the Punangairi Visitor Centre we have the honour of being kaitiaki of the Cave Creek Memorial Book.
On 28 April 1995, 17 students from the Outdoor Recreation course at Tai Poutini Polytechnic at Greymouth and the Department of Conservation’s Punakaiki Field Centre Manager crowded onto the viewing platform high above Cave Creek in Paparoa National Park on the West Coast of the South Island. The platform collapsed and fell about 30 metres into the “resurgence” below - the place where the water from the cave returned to the surface. As a result 14 people lost their lives and the other four were injured, some very seriously.
A memorial plaque to the victims of Cave Creek was unveiled in 1996.n 1998, three years after the Cave Creek tragedy, the track was opened again to the public, with new stairs to replace the old ones which had been removed. The viewing platform was not rebuilt.In a 2005 interview, a survivor of the collapse said he was worried that some of the group shaking the platform had led to the collapse, but official opinion was unchanged that the platform was dangerous and would have collapsed regardless.In 2020, to mark the 25th anniversary of the tragedy the Cave Creek track was renamed Cave Creek / Kotihotiho Memorial Track.To find more information on the Cave Creek / Kotihotiho Memorial Track you can view the Department of Conservation website below