First shipment of aid arrives in Tonga

The first shipment of aid sent to Tonga by New Zealand community members and businesses is finally being unpacked after completing mandatory quarantine on Tongatapu

51 containers have so far arrived at Queen Salote Wharf in Nuku'alofa but Tongan authorities only have enough manpower to manually unload two containers a day - so it will take up to four weeks to complete.

More aid is on its way and the Aotearoa Tonga Relief Committee wants to help speed up the off-loading process by sending forklifts.

Secretary Pakilau Manase Lua has issued a call to businesses in New Zealand asking for at least four forklifts to send to Tonga.

"It's a huge task. We've had about probably over 80-100 volunteers come in - staggered over the last three to four weeks, so it's huge effort"

These things are heavy, they are around 150-200kg on average, and so we had a bit of help with the forklifts so we know the pain that the brothers in Tonga are going to go through trying to unpack those things."

Pakilau said the team at Mt Smart Stadium in Auckland is also in need of additional forklifts too.

"It's amazing news, our co-chair honorable Jenny Salesa received some good news last night, some of our containers have been offloaded already despite delays with the lockdown and the recent Covid-19 cases and have been passed through the customs and the inspection and have been distributed out to the villages".

"It's the first containers to be taken off, it's a huge logistical [process], you can understand that Tonga has limited capacity on the wharf, they can only clear two containers a day apparently of our goods. There's almost 51 containers that have been sent in the last two weeks from here, they've all landed in Tonga around the same time so that is a lot of stuff, it's over one-thousand-tons of shipping and close to five thousand individual pieces of drums, boxes".

"We are just a bit disappointed we didn't think of this earlier, we should have sent a couple of forklifts, the army are going to manually lift the drums, that's why it is taking so long, they don't have the capacity on the wharf apparently to do all this, you can imagine there are alot of other aid and shipment containers that have arrived in Tonga, but the King's armed forces have said no, we'll shoulder this, and they are literally going to be lifting these things out."

"It's not too late we have another shipment going next week and we might put a couple of forklifts in there to help the boys at the wharf out."

"We need to borrow at least another four at Mt Smart [Stadium in Auckland] for the next two weeks and we need another 2-4 to send to Tonga."

"Rather than breaking the backs of our army guys."

"It's the same feeling that our brothers over there are feeling, so I think these guys are tough, knowing the Tongan heart we have the same Tonga Mo'unga Kihe Loto - "The mountains of Tonga are in their hearts because the islands are dead flat".

Everyday people from across the country are dropping boot loads of goods off, Christchurch, Dunedin, Wellington, Palmerston North, Hawkes's Bay, Hamilton and more.

"These things are heavy." have packed water right at the front of the container and messages on the drums to help support those offloading the heavy drums.

"Aroha is a word that is thrown around lightly, but if you symbolically consider the weight of these containers that have gone over it is over one thousand tonnes of love and care sent from Aotearoa."