KEY POINTS:
A wrecked fishing boat now stuck fast on a Far North reef may eventually become another diving attraction in a growing list of dive tourism wrecks off Northland's east coast.
The 20m Seawyf has been sitting on Fairway Reef, 7km north of the entrance to Mangonui Harbour in Doubtless Bay, since March 4 when it hit the reef during darkness in heavy seas and high winds while returning from a fishing trip.
The boat's three-man crew were rescued unharmed but more than five weeks later, the local owners of the 100-tonne vessel and their insurers have been at odds over salvage and removal costs.
Northland Regional Council harbourmaster Captain Ian Niblock says no decisions have been made on what will happen to the Seawyf, which is badly damaged and holed.
"It's not desirable to have it still there but it's not going anywhere so it does allow us time to work through various options," he says.
An informal group of Doubtless Bay people is interested in the possibility of turning the vessel, now believed to be a total loss, into a dive attraction if no agreement can be reached on removing it from the exposed reef.
A resource consent would have to be approved and extensive iwi consultation undertaken before any sinking could take place.
Dive instructor Andre Kunz, who owns the Whatuwhiwhi and Kaitaia dive centre, says for the Seawyf to be sunk as a diving venue, it would have to benefit the local economy and the marine environment as an artificial reef to attract marine life.
A member of the group is putting together a report on whether such a venture would be environmentally viable.
"We like diving on things and it would be beneficial for us having it there but we're not pushing anything at the moment," Mr Kunz says.
If the vessel was sunk, it would be preferable to have it on the reef's northeast side where there was depth of water.
Mr Kunz said Fairway Reef was "not an ideal place" for a diving wreck but if it did happen, it would be "the icing on the cake" in a dive-wreck tourism trail stretching from Tutukaka, northeast of Whangarei, to the northern Far North.
Former Navy vessels Waikato and Tui have been sunk off Tutukaka, the Canterbury was sunk last year just inside the entrance to the Bay of Islands, and the former Greenpeace flagship Rainbow Warrior lies to the north on the seabed near the Cavalli Islands, just out from Matauri Bay.
A local man involved in previous efforts by the group to get a dive wreck into Doubtless Bay said a consent process would have to be gone through and the Seawyf would have to be stripped bare in its present position.
"But if it's left there, the sea will do that job itself," he said.
If the vessel was to be washed off the reef and sunk by a storm, however, there would be no need for a consent process, although local iwi would still have to agree to any dive venture proposal.
Fuel and oil have already been removed from the Seawyf and the regional council says it poses no risk to the environment.
NORTHLAND DIVE WRECKS
* Former Navy vessels Waikato and Tui, off Tutukaka.
* Canterbury, inside the entrance to the Bay of Islands.
* Former Greenpeace flagship Rainbow Warrior, near the Cavalli Islands off Matauri Bay.
