Deadly legacy of idyllic Little Waihi spot

By ELEANOR BLACK

From the shore it looks like a postcard. Waves lap the sand, a stiff breeze whips up whitecaps, and gulls circle overhead.

But the sandbar at Little Waihi can be a killer - on Thursday, 18-year-old Clinton Raymond Te Huia became the second person to drown there in 18 months.

He was on a fishing and diving trip with his father, Percy Te Huia, 44, and friend Michael Bell, 18. The two young men had recently moved to Pukehina from Hamilton and were thought to be unfamiliar with the sandbar.

They were trying to cross the bar on their way back to shore when their 4.2m aluminium boat capsized about 11.30 am.

All three were wearing lifejackets and managed to keep hold of the upturned hull. But Clinton decided to go for help and, against his father's wishes, swam into the freezing water soon after the accident, says police search controller Senior Sergeant Lyn Manning.

Clinton's distraught father detached the fuel tank and used it as flotation to swim after him, but failed to reach his son, who was caught in a rip.

Shortly after, Michael headed for shore and after 4 1/2 hours of struggling against a strong easterly current, he raised the alarm.

Maketu man Brian Goldsbury, who recovered their boat yesterday, saw the trio as they headed out.

"They followed me out [across the bar]. They waited for the waves and seemed to know what they were doing."

But locals at Maketu and Pukehina agree that the crossing can be tricky and requires experience.

Two signs at the Pukehina boat ramp warn boaties to take "extreme caution" when crossing the bar and say the best time to make the trip is two hours before or after low tide.

Tauranga woman Margaret Ewart, who has camped at Pukehina for a decade and watched Thursday's rescue, said that the sand across the mouth of the estuary was always shifting.

"You have to have a good look before setting out to cross it. It's had its fair share of tragedies down there. It's always a sigh of relief when you come in."

Since Judy Potter took over the Bledisloe Holiday Park near Maketu seven years ago, there have been five or six occasions when a bedraggled boatie has turned up on her doorstep asking for help. Three of those involved a death.

It was Mrs Potter who met an exhausted Michael Bell as he crossed the threshold of her shop late on Thursday afternoon, saying that his companions were stranded at sea.

He and Mr Te Huia were treated for hypothermia at Tauranga Hospital and discharged on Thursday night.

* An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated that the high-profile deaths of Ross Robinson, Tim Cantwell and John Lim last April occurred on the sandbar at Little Waihi. The boating accident in which the three men lost their lives occured about 7km off the Bay of Plenty coast, near Plate Island.