{"id":620398,"date":"2026-10-04T14:34:08","date_gmt":"2026-10-04T14:34:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/620398\/"},"modified":"2026-10-04T14:34:08","modified_gmt":"2026-10-04T14:34:08","slug":"wanted-to-get-him-out-gisborne-man-saves-89-year-old-from-house-fire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/620398\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Wanted to get him out’: Gisborne man saves 89-year-old from house fire"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Gisborne construction worker who dragged an 89-year-old man through the broken window of a burning house has come forward, a day after police appealed<\/a> for the rescuer to make himself known.<\/p>\n

Tim Morris, 37, walked into the Gisborne police station on Sunday morning.<\/p>\n

He and a friend had been driving along Aberdeen Rd around 1am on Saturday when they spotted the blaze and pulled over. Battling thick smoke, the pair hauled the occupant out through a broken window to safety.<\/p>\n

Morris then checked whether anyone else was inside and ran to neighbours for help. Once emergency services arrived, he and his friend slipped away into the night.<\/p>\n

Police said the 89-year-old is recovering well in hospital.<\/p>\n

Morris, who was born and raised in Gisborne, said it only sank in on Sunday morning, when his friend showed him the police appeal.<\/p>\n

“I just wanted to get him out,” he said.<\/p>\n

“It’s been a bit emotional. At the end of the day, helping people makes me feel good.”<\/p>\n

Detective Senior Sergeant John Love said Morris did not want to make a fuss when he turned up at the station.<\/p>\n

“I think that tells you quite a lot about the person who walked through our doors today,” he said.<\/p>\n

“However, thanks to his quick actions, the house occupant was able to escape a life-threatening situation.”<\/p>\n

Love said police went looking for Morris to thank him, and he had not been in any trouble.<\/p>\n

“We wanted the opportunity to shake his hand and say ‘thank you’. We got that opportunity today.<\/p>\n

“He might not consider himself a hero, but his actions made a very real difference to another person on what must have been an incredibly frightening day.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Gisborne construction worker who dragged an 89-year-old man through the broken window of a burning house has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":620399,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[12506,111,43,139,69],"class_list":["post-620398","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-gisborne","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/620398","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=620398"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/620398\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/620399"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=620398"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=620398"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=620398"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}