A Whakaari White Island eruption survivor has described the moment she grabbed her husband's hand, hearing screams around them, thinking they were going to die during the deadly 2019 blast.
Today's second witness in the WorkSafe action being heard at the Auckland District Court was Lauren Urey, wife of Matthew Urey, who spoke this morning.
Her evidence began with a video recording of an interview filmed in US in the wake of the disaster.
The WorkSafe trial heard interviews with the couple, taken just months after the deadly eruption. (Source: 1News)
"I don't remember much about the booking, because my husband did the booking," she said.
"We booked it with Royal Caribbean, it was our honeymoon.
"We booked it months before the actual date, we did it online."
Urey said she didn't remember signing any waivers, but her husband told her they did.
“"I had no idea what an alert level was, I had nothing, no information about it at all."
Answering questions in the video, she said: "We knew that it was a live volcano.
"I knew that most of the volcano was underwater.
"I knew that there would be a lot of walking involved.
"They didn't really say, like, definitely nothing about any possibility of eruption."
Urey stressed that "anyone could go", though people with mobility issues were discouraged.
She recalled the day of the deadly blast, remembering that she was "very tired" and slept on the bus to Whakatāne.
There, they got on the boat and had an "incredibly rocky" ride out to the island. Urey was "very seasick".
She recalled being told on the boat over they weren't allowed on certain parts of the volcano.
At that point, she "had no idea" what volcanic alert level Whakaari White Island was at. It was at level two at the time.
"I had nothing, no information about it at all," she said.
But the couple briefly overhead a conversation about the alert level later on the boat trip, the court heard.
She recounted being a "little iffy" and being "very paranoid" about the risk of an eruption when they landed, and asking questions of the tour guide, who reassured her.
Hard hats and the respirators were the only safety equipment they were given, she said — and they were told they didn't have to wear the respirators if they didn't want to.
"They definitely made it seem like it was no big deal, the respirator," she said.
By the time the group reached the crater, she was feeling better.
"We were having a good time," she said.
The group "were still just taking pictures and having fun" on their way back down, she added. Then the volcano erupted.
She said the eruption was "very silent", and someone else drew her attention to it.
"My heart just sank and so many people were taking pictures, I just freaked out. I'm just very paranoid," Urey said in the video.
"Kelsey [a tour guide] said 'run', she just said 'everybody run' and I just ran for my life.
"Made sure my husband was right by my side and I just ran for my life," she repeated.
"I don't remember anything but I remember we hid behind a rock.
"I could hear all the screams, it was horrible. I held my husband's hand, he was on the left side of me and I held his right hand the entire time, he was just screaming in agony, I'd never heard him scream like that before.
Survivors and family members remained silent as the video was shown. (Source: 1News)
"I remember he said he was sorry, I remember me screaming in agony, my body was sizzling.
"Everything had gone through my clothes, my body literally felt like it was just sizzling and I just said to him, I said 'I love you so much' and I said 'I'm gonna die today' and I said 'I love you, I love you'."
Urey couldn't put her respirator on because of the force of the current of ash, and she held her helmet on her head, feeling rocks falling around her. She was afraid the pair would get "buried in".
"Protecting my head was one of my main concerns but I also wanted to hold his hand, as I was positive we were going to die.
"If we were gonna die I wanted to be next to him," she said in the video interview, beginning to cry.
"I just felt for sure we were gonna die and I just wanted him to know that I loved him.
"I thought it was any second before I was gonna die.
"I just remember rocks just kind of falling, but then it just stopped, I don't even know how long it lasted."
But it felt like "forever", Urey said, by her husband's side in the video link.
"I don't really remember how I got out from behind the rock," she added.
Urey said that she didn't recognise her husband at first, because of the ash.
She only recognised him because she was holding his hand, and because of his height.
The walk back to the island's wharf felt like it was miles-long, Urey said, recalling telling her husband she couldn't do it.
"He said 'Lauren, you have to do it'," Urey said in the video interview.
When they eventually made it to the island's wharf, it was crowded.
"Everyone was very aggressive because they wanted to get on the boat," Urey said.
"I had no strength and Matt didn't want to get on without me."
She said later: "Some people were literally jumping on it [the boat] and pushing people aside, it was so insane how people were acting."
Once on the Phoenix, which took them back to Whakatāne, the couple lay down "immediately".
Fellow tourist Geoff Hopkins looked after Urey on the boat, she said, including regularly checking her pulse.
"Honestly, he saved my life," she said. "He pretty much stayed with me and Matt the entire time."
She recalled asking why they couldn't be evacuated on a helicopter, as she knew how long the boat trip was.
"I said 'I need help', I said 'I'm gonna die, I'm gonna die'," Urey said.
"He [Hopkins] kept telling me 'it's just a few more minutes'."
She recalled being "extremely depressed" during her recovery.
"I remember that they shaved off all of my hair, and I didn't find out until I was scratching my head," Urey said.
"I was all alone when I found that out and it broke me."
She recounted screaming in the middle of the night in ICU when she realised.
She didn't realise the extent of her injuries before that, she said.
“"If we were gonna die I wanted to be next to him."
During her recovery, Urey really struggled with showers and took a lot of pain medicine, she added.
She felt "very alone and very angry and very sad", and her husband was at a different hospital in Christchurch for a time, she said.
"I wasn't eating the hospital food, I refused to eat any of it. I struggled a lot with depression."
Urey also suffered a severe lung infection after the event, and couldn't breathe on her own for two or three days at one point, she said.
"They weren't sure I was gonna make it because of the lung infection."
Six defendants face health and safety charges brought by WorkSafe over alleged failings in the lead-up to the blast.
None of the charges relate to the eruption itself, or the rescue and recovery operation afterwards.
Whakaari Management Limited and its directors Andrew, James and Peter Buttle, as well as ID Tours New Zealand Limited and Tauranga Tourism Services Limited, are the defendants in the trial.
The prosecution's questions
Worksafe prosecutor McDonald questioned Urey after the video played.
McDonald noted that Urey had mentioned her respirator wouldn't stay on.
"My face was very thin so the straps didn't stay on," Urey said.
"I wasn't particularly concerned."
Urey compared the scene on the wharf to "a horror movie" and said her husband pushed her onto the rubber boat, so she didn't use the rusty ladder as her hands were badly burnt.
Asked if she would've gone on the trip if thought there was a risk of an eruption, Urey said: "100% not... I thought that we were safe."
Addressing the judge, Urey said the last three-and-a-half-years have been "extremely difficult".
"I've been having surgery once a month for approximately three years," she said.
"It has taken over our lives, and not just me and Matt, but our families have suffered tremendously.
"It's just way more beyond our physical difficulties."
Urey said she's had between 50 and 75 surgeries since the eruption.
Questions from the defence
Lawyer for ID Tours David Neutze questioned Urey after McDonald had finished her questions.
As with her husband, he acknowledged her courage in sharing her story, and thanked her for describing her "traumatic" and "harrowing" experience to the court.
He brought up a Royal Caribbean shore excursion brochure on the screen in court, and asked Urey if she'd gone through the brochure with her husband. She said she did remember the brochure and had seen it before the tour.
The brochure describes Whakaari as "one of the most active volcanoes in the world".
It mentions "roaring steam vents" and an "amazing lake of steaming acid".
But Urey stressed they wouldn't have considered a trip if they thought it wasn't safe.
"Yes, I was iffy but for me that wasn't abnormal," she said.
She said that she had PTSD already at the time of the eruption due to an earlier unrelated incident: "I worry to an extreme."
But she was told by one of the guides that a system at the top of the crater would give them a 10-minute warning of an eruption, Urey said - and like her husband, she took comfort from booking the tour through a reputable company, Royal Caribbean.
In the Royal Caribbean brochure, the only items under the heading "what to wear" are "walking shoes", "hats and sunglasses" and "breathing apparatus (provided, to wear on White Island)".
At the end of the questions, Judge Evangelos Thomas addressed Urey directly, as he did with her husband earlier today.
"On behalf of everyone here, we're all just so sorry for what you've both been through and what your families have been through.
"We're very glad you have each other," he said. "We wish you the very best."
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