Yacht in distress, Saturday/Sunday/Monday.

Alan Murgatroyd from Northland Coastguard Air Patrol

Northland Coastguard Air Patrol were airborne on a routine training exercise on Sunday morning, 18th March, when they were asked to fly to a position South East of Tutakaka. A yacht with two elderly persons on board, one man aged 77 and his 70 year old wife had sent out a Mayday distress call asking to be taken off their stricken vessel as they were exhausted after spending the night at sea with system failures on board, principally loss of steering and some power to navigation equipment.

They had transmitted a position around 4 hours earlier, some 12 nm. S.E. of Tutakaka, but no further communication had been received, and Coastguard Northern Region requested that we positively identify the vessel and give an updated position to assist a rescue helicopter, the weather and sea state being deemed to dangerous for any Coastguard vessel to assist at that time.

NorthCAP flew to the given position but could see no vessel although they did establish communication on the Ch 16 distress frequency, so started an expanding square search to visually locate the vessel. Eventually a helicopter also located the vessel some considerable distance from the original position, and NorthCAP commenced a return to base, but then the helicopter had to return to Whangarei to refuel, and asked NorthCAP to return to the scene until it could return.
NorthCAP circled the vessel for nearly two hours, until the helicopter returned and that crew then decided that the conditions were too dangerous to try to attempt a rescue.

It was ascertained that the vessel was making way towards the Poor Nights Islands, and it was suggested that the crew on board attempt to make a landfall to the lee of the islands and possibly anchor until morning when it was hoped that they could be rescued.

The 4 NorthCAP aircrew were airborne that afternoon for nearly 4 hours in appalling weather.

A report next day in the local Press indicates that the vessel foundered overnight but that the occupants were able to get ashore and wait on a nearby rock until they were lifted off by the helicopter crew at around 05.30 on Monday morning, and that the vessel is damaged beyond reasonable repair.