09 March 2011 – Relief is on its way for Christchurch residents still without sanitation and toilet facilities following last month’s devastating earthquake with Hirepool Limited increasing its commitment to the region by a further 200 portable toilets due to arrive from Australia next week.

New Zealand’s equipment solutions leader has sourced the additional Port-A-Loos from Onsite, its sister company in Australia, in response to an urgent request from Christchurch City Council (CCC), with whom Hirepool has established a close working relationship since the original quake first struck the Canterbury region back in September 2010.

Hirepool Chief Executive Mark Powell says the additional units from Onsite have been made possible thanks to the support of “a number of our friends in Australia who are well aware of the situation in Christchurch and very keen to assist where they can, particularly Toll Holdings.

“In this case they made available 10 containers at short notice to ship the 200 portable toilets from Sydney direct to Nelson which will be transported by truck to Christchurch for distribution early next week.”

Mr Powell says through Hirepool Port-A-Loo, it supplied close to 600 portable toilets to CCC last year, which were located on a number of street corners in Christchurch, with around 200 still in place around some of the worst affected areas when last month’s quake hit the CBD and surrounding areas.

Hirepool’s Port-A-Loo business is the largest supplier of portable sanitation in New Zealand, with around 5,000 standard, executive and de-luxe units available from all Hirepool locations nationwide. Since the new quake it has sent a further 300 standard non-flushing units, because of the lack of usable water in Christchurch, and Mr Powell says it also advised Civil Defence authorities that it was able to mobilise out of Australia as many units as they required.

In addition to the 500 portable toilets, Hirepool has provided Christchurch City with 15 portable buildings and 10 x 5000 litre capacity under-ground water tanks. There has also been significant demand from Civil Defence and contractors directly involved in the restoration process with Hirepool supplying generators, excavators, trailers, pumps, tarpaulins, access machines, and scaffolding to support the region, in addition to commercial vehicles from Hirepool’s Rhodes Rentals business.

Earlier this week Hirepool announced it had acquired the assets of Hamilton-based Cube Innovations, a manufacturer and supplier of portable buildings, ranging in size up to 12 metres x 3 metres. The stock of around 70 buildings include portable lunchrooms, office blocks, shower units and short-term accommodation units.

Mr Powell says a number of these would also be supplied to CCC for use in semi-permanent applications “where needed across the city”.

Hirepool has more than 50 branches nationwide from Whangarei to Invercargill.

ENDS

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