Fishermen rescued off Tora coast

Surfers and a nearby boat crew helped rescue two people uninjured from a fishing vessel sinking off the South Wairarapa coast on Wednesday afternoon.
The commercial boat Alpha 3 hit trouble around 1pm on Wednesday about 400m off the Awhea River mouth near Tora, police search and rescue co-ordinator sergeant Murray Johnston said.
Masterton police received an alert about the stricken vessel from people working ashore who saw the boat going down, he said.
Mr Johnston said a craypot line had fouled a propeller on the Alpha 3, which started sinking after water flooded the stern while crewmembers were freeing the machinery.
He said the two crewmembers were forced while waiting for rescue to cling to the windscreen of the vessel as only its bow jutted from the waves.
They were accompanied during their wait by three surfers who had paddled out when they realised the vessel was in trouble.
One of the surfers said yesterday that they had been prepared to help the fishermen back in by surfboard had the danger increased, but it wasn't necessary.
"They were probably quite lucky that it was reasonably calm. We just talked to them and made sure they were OK," the surfer said.
Communications with Tora were broken at first but a search and rescue team was launched and a shoreline radio link was established at the site.
Another commercial boat, Mivon, was asked to help although the vessel was 15 minutes away.
Crew aboard another fishing boat from the same company as Alpha 3 heard of the trouble and went to help but failed to tell police.
Westpac was still coming from Wellington and Mivon was on the way but by the time search and rescue were confirmed Alpha 3 was being towed and was about 200m
rescue were confirmed Alpha 3 was being towed and was about 200m offshore, the air rescue team had almost arrived. The boat was towed 50m off shore before it sank completely, Mr Johnston said.
The Alpha 3 crew didn't have time to get to the radio, he said, but the crew who picked them up "considerably wasted resources" although they may not have realised there was a search and rescue in progress.
A Channel 4 emergency radio frequency was especially set up for the isolated area and all fishing boats should be scanning that band, he said, as communications at Tora are notoriously unreliable.
"The boat that rescued Alpha 3 should have known to use it."
Westpac Helicopter crewman Keith Frewen said yesterday a call that the boat crew may have been rescued came from Wairarapa police about four minutes after the rescue team took off from their Wellington base on Wednesday afternoon. "There were apparently conflicting reports about the boaties having been rescued but as police couldn't confirm this, it was decided to carry on," Mr Frewen said.
The trip to Tora takes about half an hour return, he said, with the cost for the helicopter of about $2000 an hour. "When we got there we didn't touch down but hovered over the boat and were given the thumbs-up from that they were all right."