Essential workers line up for Covid-19 jabs in Timaru
Regan Koster and his workers getting ready to be vaccinated today yesterday
Staff from an Timaru Air Conditioning company working on Covid-19 treatment rooms at Timaru Hospital were among the early people getting vaccinations at a special clinic on Monday morning.
Regan Koster said his essential worker staff at Cool Air Refrigeration have been setting up rooms at the hospital, something which was done in the 2020 lockdown as well.
“We started on Thursday, and we’ve done eight rooms. It’s negative pressure ventilation. It creates lower pressure in the rooms. “I was booked in for the end of September, but I saw on social media they were opening at Alpine Energy so we thought we’d get in early while we’re working at the hospital.”
Koster and his staff received their doses at a new vaccination centre at Alpine Energy in Washdyke.
The South Canterbury District Health Board opened the week-long clinic to meet the increased demand from the community this week.
The new vaccination clinic at Alpine House, 24 Elginshire St, Washdyke, will have capacity to deliver over 2000 COVID-19 vaccinations,” the South Canterbury District Health Board said on Friday.
“It was really well-organised, all the chairs were laid out. You couldn’t get it any more efficient,” Koster said.
Koster’s business also had an on-call service for farms and factories and he said “it’s been busy, busy, rush, rush”.
“I had a call-out to a farm yesterday at 6pm. You can get break-downs on dairy farm milk silos and if the milk is not cold, they can’t get paid for it.”
It has been busy for other refrigeration companies with Jeremy McDonald of Thompsons Refrigeration and Air Conditioning saying he had kept operating despite a few issues over the weekend with the Internet playing up.
“We can only do a small portion of the work we normally do.”
On Monday he had call-outs to the Benmore power station, another from Maersk shipping to fix faults in containers of food and one from KiwiRail.
“Freight is still moving, everything is difficult. But I’d rather be here than in Auckland.
Cool Air workers, from left, Hamish MacGregor, Daniel Stoddart, Regan Koster Billy Linton and Jack Prattley have been preparing Covid-19 rooms at Timaru Hospital. (JOHN BISSET/STUFF)
“It is going to set everyone back, people will get further behind with their workload.”
He said the lockdown was a big concern especially for small companies.
“But I see a lot of people out walking. They’re enjoying the break.”
Active Refrigeration South Canterbury (ARSC), which serviced large industry clients such as Fonterra, McCains and Sanford, has 16 staff in Timaru and “under level 4 they’re working from home travelling to sites in their own vehicles,” director Sarah Flynn said.
“It’s just business as usual really. We’ve got safe work protocols, extra PEP gear. We’ve had our apprentices staying at home.”
ARSC also had branches in Dunedin, Invercargill and Central Otago and one of the biggest challenges was getting essential workers from overseas, Flynn said.
“We’re working with the Government and immigration because our trade is so specialised, and it’s hard finding the people with the qualifications and experience.”
Flynn said they could take on another four staff.
“Unfortunately we’ve advertised for people and get no applications from New Zealanders.”