{"id":591553,"date":"2026-09-06T03:00:10","date_gmt":"2026-09-06T03:00:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/591553\/"},"modified":"2026-09-06T03:00:10","modified_gmt":"2026-09-06T03:00:10","slug":"whakaari-white-island-helicopter-pilot-mark-law-on-taking-risks-and-building-resilience-ask-me-anything-with-paula-bennett","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/591553\/","title":{"rendered":"Whakaari White Island helicopter pilot Mark Law on taking risks and building resilience \u2013 Ask Me Anything with Paula Bennett"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n Speaking to
\n Paula Bennett on her podcast Ask Me Anything<\/a>, Law says he struggled with being criminally charged.\n <\/p>\n

\u201cFirst of all, you know, they charge us as a criminal, but like I\u2019ve said so many times, I\u2019m not a criminal.\u201d<\/p>\n

The prosecution followed one of the most extraordinary days of his life.<\/p>\n

Law was driving down the Matat\u0101 Straights when he saw a dark plume rising from Whakaari and his phone started buzzing.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was just, \u2018there\u2019s been an eruption\u2019. Hardly any information.\u201d<\/p>\n

He jumped in a helicopter and headed for the island.<\/p>\n

At first, Law struggled to see anyone through the ash. Then he began spotting victims.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd then I just see more and more and more.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen once I sort of tuned in, and was just flying around, I was like, oh man, there\u2019s just a lot of people here.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"MarkMark Law’s extraordinary life is detailed in a new book, Lucky You’re Tough, by Mark Law and Ron Crosby.<\/p>\n

Law landed the helicopter and was met with gas so strong, he began choking. He put on a mask before running towards those on the ground.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere were so many people I came across that were dead, dying, a few people alive, a couple of people could talk, one moaning softly.\u201d<\/p>\n

While Law and others worked on the rescue, the volcano remained active.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe vent was still just cranking. It was so noisy and there was ash still falling on us, and every now and again it\u2019s just big booms and going on.\u201d<\/p>\n

His rescue efforts that day earned Law the New Zealand Bravery Star, the country\u2019s second highest bravery honour.<\/p>\n

It was a stark contrast to the criminal proceedings against his company, K\u0101hu NZ, that followed.<\/p>\n

Law says the prosecution and fine have made rebuilding his business difficult.<\/p>\n

\u201cBanks just won\u2019t have a bar of you because I\u2019ve got a 200 grand fine.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd, you know, you could easily just sort of crumble up, fold it up and put it on Trade Me and go and retire.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Law is not one to opt for the easy path.<\/p>\n

\u201cI crawled back, worked hard and got back there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Listen to the full episode<\/a> for more from Mark Law on:<\/p>\n

Joining the SAS at just 18 How an independent childhood built resilience Why fear shouldn\u2019t always stop you<\/p>\n

Ask Me Anything is an NZ Herald podcast hosted by former Deputy Prime Minister Paula Bennett. New episodes are available every second Sunday.<\/p>\n

You can follow the podcast at iHeartRadio<\/a>, Apple Podcasts<\/a>, Spotify<\/a> or wherever you get your podcasts. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Speaking to Paula Bennett on her podcast Ask Me Anything, Law says he struggled with being criminally charged.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":591554,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[63058,95,32758,40923,57197,674,7500,6381,43765,2740,47065,2514,8307,32573,14909,111,43,139,69,90,52990,19723,12879,1519,5764,4758,21419,50072,1316,16550,102],"class_list":["post-591553","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-63058","tag-and","tag-anything","tag-ask","tag-bennett","tag-building","tag-december","tag-erupted","tag-flew","tag-former","tag-helicopter","tag-island","tag-law","tag-mark","tag-me","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-on","tag-paula","tag-pilot","tag-resilience","tag-risks","tag-soldier","tag-taking","tag-towards","tag-whakaari","tag-when","tag-white","tag-with"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591553","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=591553"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591553\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/591554"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=591553"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=591553"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=591553"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}