Family bitter at sea tragedy

Anna Ye and Louis Ng before the rescue attempt that went horribly wrong. Picture / Kenny Rodger

Louis Ng and his wife, Anna Ye, were soulmates. They lived together, worked together and even shared the same Chinese birthday.

Now Mr Ng is mourning the loss of his wife, one of a party who set out to rescue someone in trouble, and ended up losing her own life after being trapped under an upturned boat.

Her family say she died after the boatie they were trying to rescue, whose name they still don't know, refused to leave his own craft and climb on board theirs to safety.

Instead, the rescue unravelled in a horrific way.

Anna Ye, 41, was part of a family group who went out on Raglan Harbour for a day's fishing on Sunday. She could not swim and was wearing a lifejacket.

"My wife loved fishing," Mr Ng said.

By about 10.30am the Pakuranga couple were on the water with Mr Ng's cousin Gun Lai and three other passengers.

It was low tide and Mr Lai decided it was not safe to try to cross the bar with so many on board, Mr Ng said.

The family then noticed a 5m boat with a young couple attempting to cross the bar several times, twice stalling the motor.

Mr Lai and his friends started waving and calling out, trying to warn the couple it was dangerous, but they circled around and tried again.

"A boat came up past us like a sports car," Mr Ng said. "I was saying to Gun, 'Those stupid people are trying to kill themselves' ... The boat went up vertical, twice, right out of the water."

Mr Lai piloted the 6.5m fishing boat to the stricken vessel, which by then had let off a flare.

After calling the police, Mr Lai decided to try to help the couple.

They managed to get the woman on board.

"I grabbed her myself," Mr Ng said. "Gun was saying, 'Abandon the boat', because it was too risky ... The man refused to. He tried to save his boat."

Mr Lai said he was reluctant to tow the boat but eventually agreed when the boatie insisted. After a nylon towrope broke, the two boats were tied together with an anchor chain.

Mr Lai said yesterday that he felt uncomfortable towing the boat because it was too heavy and not worth risking his passengers' safety.

Just as he was calling the police to ask if it was all right to leave the man in his boat because he refused to come on board, someone called that a big wave was coming.

Mr Lai called for the rope to be cut, not knowing that it was the anchor chain, which meant the boats could not be separated.

The wave hit, and both boats capsized.

When Mr Ng surfaced, the first thing he did was try to count the people in the water.

"All of a sudden I thought, 'Where's my wife?' I could not see her."

He tried twice to get back under the boat.

"It was dark and I was terrified, but not worried about my safety ... My wife was the priority."

As the boat drifted closer to shore it started to turn. As it did, Mrs Ng's unconscious body was revealed in the far corner.

Thw Westpac rescue helicopter flew her to Waikato Hospital, where she died on Wednesday night.

Back in his Ti Rakau Drive home, Mr Ng broke down as he said he did not even know the name of the man they had saved.

He looked around and said how his wife had loved the "dream house" they had bought just a week before Christmas after two years of searching.

It is a cheerful home, just four years old, and full of yellow. They lived there with Mrs Ye's 14-year-old daughter, Cindy Ye, and her mother, Zhaodi Wang.

"We both loved yellow. We were both Leos. She was born on the second of August and I the third. But we are born on the same day in the Chinese calendar."

Mr Ng said they worked together in the garment industry, cutting out All Black jerseys.

"We saw each other almost 24 hours a day. We were so in love," he said.

Mr Lai, a former commercial fisherman, said he was angry about the way his cousin's wife lost her life.

"You can't replace a life but you can replace a boat," he said.

"If that guy had come on board we wouldn't have had a problem."

Mr Lai has not heard from the couple he tried to help.

The Maritime Safety Authority is investigating the incident.