Jason Savage, 35, was killed in that crash and RNZ can reveal that he was a boarder at Seymour\u2019s house.<\/p>\n
\u201cPolice can confirm the vehicle, and the deceased are connected to the Kaha St address,\u201d said Detective Senior Sergeant Varnia Allan, in a statement this week.<\/p>\n
\u201cPolice are working to establish what exactly has occurred at the Kaha St address.\u201d<\/p>\n
Seymour mostly lived alone at his one-storey house but would sometimes take in boarders for periods of time, RNZ understands.<\/p>\n
\u2018Bad things have happened to a good guy\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cFor the last 12 months of Seymour\u2019s life, he got his act together,\u201d a close friend, who asked not to be named, told RNZ.<\/p>\n
\u201cSomething changed. John had purpose. He had friends, who were very supportive, around him … That\u2019s why it\u2019s such a big shock to us.\u201d<\/p>\n
Seymour was a fitter, a highly skilled engineer who would travel around New Zealand on different jobs.<\/p>\n
However, his life changed more than a decade ago when he suffered a brain aneurysm or bleed.<\/p>\n
His friend said Seymour was not found for two days and then spent three months in hospital. <\/p>\n
After he was discharged he could not return to his former work, and it took a while to adjust to the change.<\/p>\n
But recently he had developed a good network of people around him, and had bought a large lathe, which he kept at a workshop.<\/p>\n
He also had a wood splitting business. A sign advertising this is still visible at the front of the charred wreckage of his house.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was getting out of bed. He was spending a lot of time at this workshop,\u201d his friend\u2019s partner said.<\/p>\n
The pair were out of the district when the fire happened. They said Seymour would have known he could have come to them if he was in trouble.<\/p>\n
He was a private man who had been into skiing and had formed close relationships with former colleagues and those he spent time with at his workshop.<\/p>\n
He was friendly towards others in Rangataua, a small community he loved, where locals had to be resilient.<\/p>\n
They said a planned memorial service for Seymour on Friday would likely be full of people he had met during his time working throughout the country.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was just a special person. He would do anything for anyone. He was always willing to stop and have a chat,\u201d his friend said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was in a good space. Bad things have happened to a good guy. It\u2019s devastating to everyone concerned he\u2019s left behind.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s just a shock to everyone.\u201d<\/p>\n
Explosions during fire cause concern<\/p>\n
A neighbour told RNZ Seymour would often come around and clear her guttering, as he had for the person who lived in the house before her.<\/p>\n
He also loved the dogs that lived in the neighbourhood.<\/p>\n
Angie Miller said she lived a couple of hundred metres from Seymour\u2019s house.<\/p>\n
She had known who he was for almost two decades, but mostly just to wave at. Others in the village were closer.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy friends say he was a very kind person and very knowledgeable.\u201d<\/p>\n
Last Thursday Miller saw flames and had walked closer to the scene for a look but retreated after hearing explosions.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was quite worried about the firefighters.\u201d<\/p>\n
When RNZ visited the scene, emergency tape fluttered in the chill wind blowing off the slopes of Mt Ruapehu, which loomed in the background.<\/p>\n
A sign outside warned of hazards, including the \u201cunstable structure\u201d and a diesel tank.<\/p>\n
A burned-out vehicle was parked in front of the house.<\/p>\n
Rangataua\u2019s population might hit a couple of hundred, but that would likely be during the winter ski season or summer holidays, and many of the houses are unoccupied most of the time.<\/p>\n
Chris Williams lives along Kaha St and saw the fire take hold.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere were a lot of flames. It was getting to the point where it was just engulfing the house.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe heard the fire trucks and the alarms. We didn\u2019t take any notice until we smelt the smoke coming our way.\u201d<\/p>\n
Williams said he knew Seymour by sight, but not well.<\/p>\n
After the fire, police wearing white overalls had combed the scene.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe next three or four days afterwards were just teaming with police. They asked me what I saw – if I saw anything or any suspicious people.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s no suspicious people here. We all know one another.\u201d<\/p>\n
The village was quiet and everyone seemed to mind their own business, Williams said.<\/p>\n
-RNZ<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jason Savage, 35, was killed in that crash and RNZ can reveal that he was a boarder at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":392953,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1975,203028,7800,28527,3944,3549,6179,33912,1874,10053,78,1736,5158,111,43,139,69,199800,6736,540,1299],"class_list":["post-392952","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-at","tag-boarder","tag-body","tag-burned","tag-car","tag-crash","tag-died","tag-ellingham","tag-found","tag-house","tag-in","tag-jimmy","tag-man","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-rangataua","tag-was","tag-where","tag-who"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/392952","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=392952"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/392952\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/392953"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=392952"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=392952"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=392952"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}