On November 28, 1979, an Air New Zealand jet took off from Auckland Airport on a sightseeing trip to Antarctica. There were 257 people on board. Hours later everyone was dead. Somehow, the plane had flown directly into the Erebus volcano. This was a disaster that shattered a country’s psyche. In the decades since, grief gave way to blame, anger and recrimination. Who was responsible for so many deaths? Was there a cover-up? How could a plane just fly into a mountain? To mark the 40th anniversary of the disaster, Michael Wright and Katy Gosset explore why New Zealand’s deadliest disaster was also its most controversial; why a nation was incapable of moving on; and how it was captured by one famous phrase: ‘an orchestrated litany of lies’. White Silence will be released daily from November 8, 2019.
A lethal virus. A drastic lockdown. A nation turned upside down.
From the makers of acclaimed podcasts The Commune, True Story and Witi Underwater, this eight-part narrative series revisits the Covid-19 pandemic with the benefit of hindsight and powerful interviews. Adam Dudding and Eugene Bingham delve into what really happened – and what it taught us about ourselves.
Subscribe to "Quarantine Nation" wherever you get your podcasts, or follow the links here: https://linktr.ee/quarantinenation
Made with the support of NZ on Air for Stuff by Te Pūrongo Productions.
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2 Aug 2024
Introducing: The Trial - Philip Polkinghorne
On Easter Monday 2021, police were called to the home of a successful professional couple in the affluent Auckland suburb of Remuera. They found the body of Pauline Hanna.
In his emergency call, her husband, Philip Polkinghorne, said she killed herself. Sixteen months later he was charged with her murder. As this podcast is released, he's currently on trial at the High Court in Auckland.
Stuff's groundbreaking series returns to take you inside the Polkinghorne trial: Hear the witnesses, follow the evidence, wait for the verdict.
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19 Dec 2019
Episode Eight - The Apology
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern speaks to White Silence about her decision to say sorry to the families of the Erebus victims: “It all built a picture for me of unfinished business, and that wasn't right.”
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27 Nov 2019
Episode Seven - Playing Through
A special bonus episode of White Silence for November 28 - the anniversary of the Erebus disaster. Bringing together stories from listeners like Air NZ staff who had to work through the tragedy, a teenager's 40-year trauma finally brought to a close and an unlikely golf tournament played in the shadow of Erebus.
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12 Nov 2019
Episode Six - White Silence
40 years after the Erebus disaster, there is still no national memorial to the victims and no consensus on exactly what happened that day in 1979. Why has New Zealand been so hopelessly unable to deal with its worst-ever disaster?
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11 Nov 2019
Episode Five - New World Order
In 1981, New Zealand was changing. The baby boomers had come of age, and the South African rugby tour was about to tear the country apart. When the Mahon report landed right in the middle of this, the country was ready for its first big conspiracy theory.
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10 Nov 2019
Episode Four - The Lovesong of J Alfred Prufrock
‘An orchestrated litany of lies’ is ingrained into New Zealand’s collective consciousness. Justice Peter Mahon didn’t have to say that, but he did. It would prove the making of him, and the ruin.
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9 Nov 2019
Episode Three - All hell
With the pilots’ reputations in tatters, a second investigation into the crash unearths appalling mistakes and a sensational new theory for what caused the crash.
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8 Nov 2019
Episode Two - The caravan
Whose fault was it? Investigators sift through the evidence and reach a shocking conclusion.
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7 Nov 2019
Episode One - The break-in
On November 28, 1979, an Air New Zealand DC10 took off from Auckland Airport on a sightseeing trip to Antarctica. It never returned. What do the families remember of that fateful day?
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6 Nov 2019
White Silence - Trailer
On November 28, 1979, an Air New Zealand airliner took off from Auckland Airport on a sightseeing trip to Antarctica. There were 257 people on board. Hours later everyone was dead.
Somehow, the plane had flown directly into the Erebus volcano. This was a disaster that shattered a country’s psyche.
In White Silence, Michael Wright and Katy Gosset explore why New Zealand’s deadliest disaster was also its most controversial; why a nation was incapable of moving on; and why it was captured by one famous phrase: ‘an orchestrated litany of lies’.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Inside a recent episode
Trailer: Quarantine Nation
Published 3 Mar 2026 · Transcript excerpt
[…] We're fearful for the future. But also, we're baking quite a lot of sourdough. I'm Adam Dudding. I'm Eugene Bingham. And in our new series, Quarantine Nation, we are looking back at New Zealand's experience of a global catastrophe that kicked off just six years ago, but which many of us have already half forgotten. And yeah, it's got a pretty cool theme tune. Across eight episodes, we hear from the people who shaped the country's COVID response. I can recall pacing around the room, thinking we've just got to move quickly, we've got to move quickly. And those who were in the room when the big decisions were being made. […]
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