Anti-nuke vessel finally home after 10 years

Skipper Daniel Mares with his daughter Stella, 6, on board the Vega in Auckland. Photo / Richard Robinson

An important piece of New Zealand's maritime history sailed back into the Waitemata Harbour yesterday after more than 10 years abroad.

The 11.6m Vega - once a key vessel in Greenpeace nuclear protests - will now make Auckland its home port.

The boat was built in Whangarei in 1949, reportedly from a single kauri log.

Current skipper Daniel Mares said the Vega entered the anti-nuclear struggle in 1971 when Greenpeace founding member David McTaggart sailed it to Mururoa Atoll to protest against French atmospheric tests.

The Vega has sailed into nuclear blast zones on countless occasions, Mr Mares said.

"It's been a David-and-Goliath story right through. This little vessel has challenged some of the biggest and most powerful navies in the world."

Mr Mares' personal history with the yacht began in 1984, when he worked on board as a deckhand.

"At that point, we did a tour right around Australia protesting against the uranium that was being exported from there," he said.

"We knew that ultimately that uranium would end up being used in nuclear weapons being used to bomb the Pacific Islands."

The Vega shares a lot of history with the old Greenpeace flagship Rainbow Warrior.

"The day the Warrior was bombed [July 10, 1985, in Auckland] the Vega was tied up alongside her until an hour before the bomb went off," said Mr Mares.

When the Mururoa nuclear tests resumed in the mid-1990s, the Vega was "arrested" while protesting near the atoll and interned by the French authorities for eight months.

Mr Mares was a member of the crew that went to recover the yacht.

"I got on board and all the wiring had been pulled out, the water was over the bilge boards, there was food on plates that had been there for eight months and everything was in disarray."

The French forced them to leave Mururoa Atoll despite the vessel's unhealthy state, and Mr Mares sailed the yacht to Tahiti.

That was to be the last time he would skipper the Vega before sailing it from Australia to New Zealand on its most recent voyage.

Mr Mares, with his wife Pia Mancia and friends, have bought the yacht and plan to keep it in NZ. Said Ms Mancia: "We'd like to set it up as a trust for getting young people involved in teaching them about the marine environment and the nuclear movement."