Inspector Mark Fergus and Inspector Willi Fanene update the circumstances around the Francie disaster at Kaipara Harbour.
A survivor on the doomed fishing boat The Francie was too big for his lifejacket, but managed to swim to shore while clinging on to it.
Iripa Iripa's family, who heard about the incident in the news, told NZME he was discharged from hospital on Sunday night.
Iripa, who was one of three survivors, "managed to grab a lifejacket but it wouldn't fit him so he hung onto it and floated to shore", said the man's uncle.
Flags were at half mast in Helensville after Saturday's maritime tragedy.
Seven people died and one is missing presumed dead after the boat capsized as it tried to enter Kaipara Harbour on Saturday after a fishing charter.
READ MORE: Kaipara Harbour disaster: Tragic boatie's daughter studying to become a skipper[1]
Police on Sunday confirmed the boat's owner Bill McNatty was among the dead, while all the others on board The Francie were Pacific Islander males aged between 31 and 59.
Emergency services and volunteers gather to search for missing boaties.
They included four people from Tonga, one from Samoa and one from the Cook Islands.
Of the three survivors, one managed to swim to shore while two were winched to safety by helicopter. They are of Samoan and Cook Island descent.
The search for the remaining missing person was stood down for the day on Sunday evening due to poor weather conditions.
Strong winds and large waves are battering Muriwai Beach as the search for bodies from the Kaipara boat tragedy continues.
Police have asked that if anyone finds debris that they suspect could be from the capsized boat, or have already taken debris, to contact police immediately.
Searchers will resume their efforts tomorrow morning around 5.30am.
Rodney area commander Inspector Mark Fergus said the fishermen were a group of friends who often went fishing together.
With one person, believed to be a Cook Islander, still missing it was believed they were likely deceased, he said.
Bill McNatty, owner of The Francie, is presumed to have died along with seven others when his boat capsized in the Kaipara Harbour.
A number of investigations were underway and while there were lifejackets on board it was unknown if they had been used.
"I can confirm as part of the inquiries we will be assessing if there is any culpability on the part of anyone involved."
There was no sign of The Francie at this stage, he said.
Bill McNatty, owner of The Francie - please use other image supplied by family
Inspector Willi Fanene said an officer had been assigned to each of the victim's families to support them.
"Not only is this a terrible tragedy for the New Zealand fishing community in general it's especially hard for the Pacific community.
"I know that the grief will be shared not only through the Pacific community in New Zealand and overseas but by all New Zealanders."
Tim Jago, Oliver Tyack and Ashley Clarke had been assisting with the search for missing fishermen lost when their charter boat attempted to cross the Kaipara Harbour bar.
The boat chanced the Kaipara Harbour bar's mountainous seas two days in a row – the only vessel to notify Coast Guard it was doing so.
On its fourth crossing, disaster struck when it capsized.
Coast Guard spokesman Ray Burge said radio logs show The Francie was the only vessel crossing the treacherous bar on Friday and Saturday.
Gus Tupou is grieving the loss of his friend, skipper Bill McNatty.
At just after 2pm on Saturday, The Francie contacted Coast Guard to say it was heading into the harbour across the bar with 11 people on board.
The Francie requested a 60-minute watch, meaning the Coastguard would contact them again after 60 minutes to make sure they were safe, Burge said.
The average safety window time boats crossing the bar give is 30 minutes, but sea conditions sometimes mean boats request longer windows, he said.
Emergency services coordinate search and rescue efforts at a Defence Force establishment on the south head of the Kaipara Harbour, after a charter boat overturned with the loss of at least five lives.
By 3.02pm when The Francie still hadn't been heard from, and the alert was raised.
Volunteers rushing out onto the harbour described just how dangerous the seas were to Burge.
"What I can tell you is that our volunteers reported four metre swells [in the harbour]".
The Francie, a charter fishing boat, had previously towed another boat to safety, from peril on the Kaipara bar, but on Saturday came to grief herself.
But over the bar seas were even higher, with waves breaking on top of the swell likely raising seas close to the height of a two storey house.
Coastguard Rescue Vessel skipper Iain Guilford described the sea conditions as trying with "huge standing waves" in excess of four metres.
"It's never easy being part of an incident where you can't bring people home to their families. Our thoughts are with everyone involved."
Rescue crews at the Kaipara Harbour boating tragedy worked late into Saturday night.
Debris from the steel hulled The Francie speaks to the force of the sea conditions.
Steve McGregor, president of Kaipara Cruising and Sportsfishing Club said McNatty had made a mistake in going beyond the bar on such a rough day.
"Bill knew what he was doing, don't get me wrong but he shouldn't have gone out past the bar."
Two Auckland Westpac Rescue Helicopters are helping in the rescue in Kaipara Harbour.
Bill McNatty attended high school in Southland, where he went to school at James Hargest College in Invercargill.
He later graduated from Waikato University with a psychology degree in 1997.
Third cousin of McNatty, Bruce Cavanagh said he had a wide range of interests that included caring for the environment and genealogy.
The Francie got into trouble in two-to-three-metre surf on the bar at the entrance to Kaipara Harbour.
Like many people he had a passion for family history, he said.
Cavanagh said they started communicating when they discovered they shared great great-grandparents.
From then the pair communicated online to piece together where their ancestors were from, he said.
"Each of us found different links to solve different puzzles."
The distant relatives only met once which was at the James Hargest College reunion in 2008.
"He was easy-going and a caring guy."
Cavanagh said he fitted in with everyone.
"You might not speak to him for five years, but then he was still the same."
McNatty was a quiet man about a lot of things, but he was a big family man, he said.
"It's a tragic event, it's sad for everyone concerned. There are no winners."
Another friend of McNatty's, Gus Tupou, said he was marooned in grief on Sunday.
Tupou worked as a deck hand on The Francie, and said he was finding the loss of his boss "very difficult to deal with".
"He was like a brother to me," Tupou said.
Tupou, 52, got a job with McNatty's charter fishing operation about five years ago, he would have been on Saturday's deadly voyage if not for choosing to spend time with a visiting friend.
McNatty's daughter, Kathleen-Jane Hotere, was also an aspiring skipper who had hoped to take over the family business.
Muriwai Beach surf lifesaving patrol captain Brett William Hardie said during a search for survivors wreckage spotted 100m off the surf break showed the Francie had "completely broken-up".
"It was obvious the super structure of the boat had completely broken up. There was nothing bigger than maybe 2 metres long and half a metre wide just floating on the water."
Earlier Muriwai lifeguard Tim Jago said surf conditions were "just about as bad as you'll ever see here".
"It's just huge surf right out to the horizon."
He said conditions on Saturday had been equa lly as bad.
"Experience would tell us that if we're going to find them (the last missing person) that we will find them today otherwise they generally sort of disappear for several more days."
By the time helicopter rescuers plucked three survivors from the waters it was too late for others aboard the Francie, by 2am, Sunday, the bodies of seven people where found.
Five bodies where found on Saturday, police recovered the body of one man around 1am on the shoreline north of Muriwai Beach, by 2am another man's body was discovered on the shoreline closer to South Head/Woodhill Forest.
Three survivors were taken to North Shore Hospital. Two were discharged overnight while the third is in a stable condition, a hospital spokeswoman said on Sunday morning.
Police said the process of formally identifying the victims and advising next of kin was underway.
Police Inspector Duncan Hall said, "inquiries are being made into what happened to the vesse l and how people ended up in the water.
NEW ZEALAND'S TRAGIC MARITIME HISTORY
* The sinking of the Wahine in the Wellington Harbour in 1968 was New Zealand's worst modern maritime disaster. Fifty-one people died when the Wellington-Lyttelton ferry capsized. Another person died a few weeks later, while a survivor died in 1990 of complications from the incident.
* In May 2006, six people died[3] after the fishing boat Kotuku capsized off the coast of Southland.
* On Anzac Day 2007, five-year-old Travis Rowles and his eight-year-old sister Erina died when the family runabout sank[4] in Auckland's Hauraki Gulf.
* In March 2012, eight people drowned after the Easy Rider capsized[5] while sizing from Bluff to the Muttonbird Islands.
* Two months later, So'saia Paasi and his seven-year-old son, Tio, died after their boat overturned[6] off Auckland's Mangere Bridge.
* In November of that year, two men drowned[7] after their fishing boat capsized near Waiheke Island.
Steve McGregor, president of Kaipara cruising and sportsfishing club said McNatty was "experienced" but not as much as others.
"Bill knew what he was doing, don't get me wrong but he shouldn't have gone out past the bar."
- Stuff
References
- ^ Kaipara Harbour disaster: Tragic boatie's daughter studying to become a skipper (www.stuff.co.nz)
- ^ Ad Feedback (stuff.co.nz)
- ^ six people died (www.stuff.co.nz)
- ^ the family runabout sank (www.stuff.co.nz)
- ^ Easy Rider capsized (assets.stuff.co.nz)
- ^ died after their boat overturned (www.stuff.co.nz)
- ^ two men drowned (www.stuff.co.nz)
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