A Samoan seasonal worker who dies was preparing to return home; another earthquake strikes New Caledonia and Tonga's disaster authorities get new facility
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Deceased Samoan seasonal worker was preparing to return home
A Samoan seasonal worker who collapsed and died in New Zealand last week was preparing to return to Samoa on a repatriation flight.
The Samoa Observer newspaper reported the 39-year-old father from Savaii died in Timaru on Thursday, the day before he was about to depart for Auckland to catch the flight to Samoa.
The Ministry of Commerce Industry and Labour Assistant Chief Executive Officer, Lemalu Nele Leilua, confirmed the death of the meat processing worker.
The worker did not have Covid-19, with officials saying he had produced a negative Covid test.
Lemalu said a post-mortem has been completed but the coroner had yet to release the results.
The worker had not finished his contract but was returning home for a family matter.
New Caledonia hit by another quake
A magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck southeast of the Loyalty Islands in New Caledonia.
The U.S. Geological Survey said the quake had a depth of 12.6 kilometres.
A magnitude 7.7 earthquake struck the same area last week, triggering a tsunami warning for New Caledonia and its neighbours.
Tonga's disaster authorities get new facility
A new warehouse has been built for Tonga's National Emergency Management Office to stockpile goods to assist the team in times of disasters.
The NEMO warehouse was commissioned this week at Poutaha and funded by the Australian government.
It has been designed and built to be prone to tropical cyclones, earthquakes, tsunami and droughts.
Australia plans to provide an additional $US31,000 to install 14 water tanks, guttering and connections at the warehouse, to give NEMO the ability to respond to any need for water from affected villages.