For the First Responders
The Christian O’Connell Show
GOLD and iHeart Australia
4.7 • 823 Ratings
🗓️ 17 December 2025
⏱️ 5 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
What began as a plan to welcome Sydney with festive hams quickly shifts in response to a difficult week, with the team deciding to pass those small gifts on to first responders instead. Josh heads to Bondi to personally thank surf lifesavers and police, hearing firsthand stories of bravery, quiet resilience, and compassion in the aftermath of recent events. From silent beaches to unexpected moments of kindness, it’s a moving reminder of the people who show up when it matters most.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | IHart Podcasts. You can hear more. Gold 104.3 podcast, playlist and listen live on the free IHart app. |
| 0:08.4 | So like I was saying, we had these Christmas hams and last week it seemed like this would be a nice way to say hello. |
| 0:15.4 | Feels like, you know, I'm moving into a new neighbourhood and going around all the local neighbours, saying hello, introducing myself, and I've got a gift for you before Christmas, okay? |
| 0:23.4 | And so now we had it this week. Everything changed and it's just like, we're away. We can't be doing that. It's not right. But look, we've got these Christmas hams. Why don't we give them to the first responders if they'd like them? So yesterday, a lovely man on this show called Josh, you went down to Bondi, you went to the |
| 0:38.8 | first responders to see if they wanted these just very small gifts to say, we see you and thank you |
| 0:44.0 | for your service. So what was that like? It was a really special moment and one that I didn't |
| 0:51.5 | know was going to be as special as it was. But as I went down to Tamerama Surf Life Saving Club, which is now their sort of main meeting point to sort of connect, to do debriefs. And so I knew I was kind of going to a main point for them. And I didn't even know how to enter him. Was it the front door? Was it the back door? How do you enter a SIF Life Saving Club? |
| 1:12.8 | And you don't want to get in the way. |
| 1:30.0 | They're also an act of life saving club. Yeah. And you don't want to be an inconvenience, but we wanted to go down and say, thank you. On behalf of not just us on the team here, but everyone in Sydney. Absolutely. And I met a gentleman by the name of Ben there, and he was sort of working out, |
| 1:35.9 | already, you know, shirt off, ready to go and jump in the water. And he met me with so much warmth. And straight away, he was just taken by the gesture. And nothing more than just a big |
| 1:42.9 | thank you. And he told me straight away that I needed to speak with a couple of other people. |
| 1:49.1 | And one was a man named Rory who actually on Sunday was there when it was all happening |
| 1:55.5 | and all the chaos. |
| 1:56.9 | His first instinct was to actually run towards the water and to save people. |
| 2:02.8 | And it truly... |
| 2:03.5 | And this is because obviously people were trying to find a safe refuge in the water. |
| 2:07.7 | Yeah. |
| 2:08.2 | People freaking out and not knowing what to do. |
| 2:10.0 | Yeah. |
| 2:10.7 | And it just really makes it very, very real in that moment to hear firsthand just how brave, how incredibly brave. |
| 2:19.4 | And the young kids. |
| 2:20.6 | Yeah. |
... |
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