Only 6% of career firefighters in New Zealand are women, but their calendar has already broken records.
If you’re a person who loves women, chances are the video has popped up on your timeline at some point in the past two weeks. Abs rippling, hair tossed, their impossibly white teeth gleam against commercial grade tans. A glorious group of New Zealand women.
The innocent video is 12 seconds long, although many claim it runs for hours. You’ve seen it on your mate’s story and again on your ex’s. The comment section ranges from adoration to threats of wilful harm. Around the globe, women have made plans to leave their husbands. The video has now been viewed just shy of 17 million times. Garnering the posting account 75,000 followers and counting.
So what’s this thirst trap video for? It’s a promotion of the first ever New Zealand women’s career firefighter calendar. Released with an ambitious goal of raising $100,000 to support the research of Breast Cancer Cure, the calendar marks a new chapter in a proud tradition of our firefighters flexing their fundraising muscles.
“When we put that first video up, it was supposed to just be a little teaser,” explains Samara Pepperell, co-organiser and content curator. “I was like, this is way too good to be a [Instagram] story, let’s chuck it in a reel. Expecting we might get a couple of thousand views and we might increase our following by maybe a hundred.”
Within an hour, they had eclipsed the following for the men’s calendar. By the end of the day, the video was officially viral, gathering what Pepperell labels “Monopoly money” numbers. Fanning the flames of these new fans became a whole other job. It’d been a long road for women in the fire service to reach this point, so surely we all could wait another week for the calendar drop.
In 1979, Anne Barry was rejected from joining the professional fire service in New Zealand, supposedly for being too short even though men her height and shorter were accepted. Undeterred, Barry then took her case to the recently formed Human Rights Commission and lobbied members of parliament. After a three-year fight, she became the first woman firefighter not just in New Zealand but in the wider Commonwealth in 1981.
Ten years after Barry’s landmark victory, the first official New Zealand firefighters calendar went to print. The same feminism that afforded Barry her place in the force afforded her male colleagues their place as objects of desire.
The launch of the 2025 Wāhine Toa calendar, then, is a moment of becoming. It marks the further integration of women into the service. As frivolous as it may appear, taking part in the calendar photoshoot has been a rite of passage for firefighters. Faded photographs are still proudly pinned up in stations around the country in a tribute to their glory days. But it’s only this year that women have finally had a calendar of their own.
“We knew that there were going to be some women that didn’t want to be a part of it,” Pepperell says, “But I wanted anyone that’s not choosing to be a part of it to be really proud that it exists.”
Co-organiser and chief instigator, Nicole Koch, agrees. “We didn’t want it to be cringey for any of the other firefighters.”
It’s the forever feminist question though, the one that split the second from third wave. What’s empowerment and what’s objectification? Can you really claim one without the other?
“I think because we’ve chosen to do this it is OK,” says Pepperell, “We can’t control how people feel, but we can try to do this with the right sort of lens.”
Koch adds: “I think it’s really important that we take up space in this job, so instead of trying to pretend we’re little men, maybe we just be ourselves.”
Koch floated the idea with her colleague Zoe Feau on shift. Once articulated, it didn’t take long to come to life. They recruited Pepperell and messages were sent to the group chat. Playful tags and wishes to turn back time transformed into a Facebook page. The date picked for the photoshoot ended up narrowing down the list to the lucky 13 who star in this calendar.
“I think we planned this whole thing and I forgot that I actually would have to pose,” laughs Koch. The nerves on the day were real. These women who run towards fire, suddenly shy at the prospect of being intentionally hot. A group round of push ups before kick-off helped prime their muscles and release some tension. As did witnessing each of their colleagues find their light.
Flora Driessen was recruited to photograph for the calendar and relished the opportunity to portray women’s beauty from a women’s perspective. “Often when you think of a firefighter shoot, it is overly saturated towards sex,” she explains. “I was like, ‘actually, let’s not do that’. We can still be sexy but powerful. I think sexy is within the power of being a woman.
“That’s the beauty of the New Zealand women’s firefighter calendar. Everyone brought something different because being a woman is being you. And what does that mean to each individual?”
The groundbreaking calendar arrives against a backdrop of unrest for the profession. Firefighters striking due to their concerns about unsafe staffing schedules and ageing equipment. They are in the middle of negotiations as they launch this calendar, providing another tightrope for the women to walk as they try to balance celebrating and advocating for the career they love.
“The union’s been really supportive and the people we’ve spoken to within the fire service have said, separate these two messages. Strike and rally with us but when you’re doing calendar stuff, focus on the [fundraising] cause,” Pepperell says.
Pepperell has been speaking from her bedroom, getting ready for the official launch to celebrate nine months of hard slog. The big decision now is what shoes to wear as they take this step forward.
Sandy Hall, Pepperell’s proud mum, makes a toast to the organising trio before they depart for the event. The project is doubly personal for Hall, who has experience breast cancer firsthand. Thanks to the early sponsorship of people like Hall, Breast Cancer Cure will receive 100% of the proceeds from the sale of these calendars.
Within 26 hours of launch, the calendar sold out its first run and raised their goal of $100,000. It’s enough to fund at least one new research project, but they’re not done yet. Pre-sales for the next run are now up on the website, taking orders from around the globe.
For those at its centre, it’s been a joyful experience of self expression, of women claiming their space in the fire service while supporting the hunt for a cure of a disease that still takes too many New Zealanders. Like all calendars, it’s there to mark the past, this moment, and help us plan for the future we want to see. More women firefighters please.
