avoid playing rugby. He had a lifelong passion for shooting, gadgets and things that went ‘bang’.


At the age of 15 his parents shifted to Whangarei and Terry started his life-long love affair with the sea. Knowing his son, his father wisely told him not to train on the deck side but to become an engineer. He served his apprenticeship at Whangarei Glass as a fitter/turner. His then boss, Owen Davies, who called him “Terence” when he blew it or played some prank on one of his fellow workmates, was to eventually become his father- in-law when he married Jean in 1984.


Terry was a recidivist traveller. As a youngster he travelled on horseback to various shows often with his lifelong girlfriend Chrisy. As a merchant seaman he travelled the world. As an engineer surveyor he travelled the length and breadth of New Zealand in his Landcruiser with a few overseas runs to remind him of how much he loved this country.


Terry started his sea-going career with a Swedish merchant shipping company as an oiler, and eventually, through hard work and perseverance with his exams, became one of the youngest chief engineers in the foreign-going merchant marine at the age of 32. Study for Terry was never easy, and it was only in the past two years that he was finally assessed and declared to be, what he termed ‘special’, with a spelling/ reading age of nine, as a result of dyslexia.


His career took him to many countries in the world and he was known to say, “If it has a port I’ve been there”. Japan was a favorite place, where he was heavily involved early in his career, with overseeing the build of large merchant ships. He loved the people and especially the food. On his last Friday he enjoyed a Japanese dinner with Jean.


Motor-sport was another of his many interests. In 1972 and 1974 he won coveted prizes for off- road racing. He drove his heavily modified 1952 series 1 Landover to victory on many occasions. His love of motor sport gave rise to a serious


accident while motor rallying and damaged his back. This revealed the arthritis that brought him constant pain and caused his hunched appearance as his spine slowly fused. However, in all my years of knowing Terry, I never once heard him complain of his disability.


In 1983 he met Jean whilst visiting his former boss Owen Davies. They were married in 1984 and promptly set off with Jean’s two girls, Leanne and Donnell, to live on board refrigerated cargo ships.


1986 saw the birth of his son Neil, and Terry decided to come ashore. In 1987 he began his journey to become an engineer surveyor by joining the Ministry of Transport Marine Division. Ironically, one of his first tasks in this role was learning all there was about the building, installation and running of lifts, a skill that ultimately cost him his life.


His first task in his new role was to clean up a large number of legacy problems with the Marine Division in the top of the South Island. It was around this time that the then government decided to get out of the vessel inspection business, and Terry and Jean started Survey Nelson Limited, which quickly became one of the largest safe ship management companies in New Zealand. However, in 2008, the then Director of MNZ commenced a process to remove Survey Nelson’s right to operate as a safe ship management company. During this period, I had the privilege


of walking next to Terry and Jean as they endured three high court actions, one Court of Appeal hearing and resisting an application to the Supreme Court, which is the highest court in our land.


In the end the courts found what Terry


and Jean knew all along, that the then Director’s poorly articulated concerns about Survey Nelson and its directors were without foundation.


Terry and Jean were successful in having their right to operate as a safe ship management company restored. But it is testimony to the man that the very reason that made him


The Report • March 2018 • Issue 83 | 25


Member News


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