Man digs himself to near disaster in dune

Paul Porter

Running out of air and unable to move under a metre of sand, Paul Porter thought he was going to die.

"I thought I was dead, that was it," the 24-year-old man said yesterday after a dramatic rescue at Bethells Beach on Auckland's West Coast.

Moments earlier the Massey man had been digging a tunnel near Lake Wainamu, trying to reach water that runs underneath the sand dunes.

Mr Porter said he was crouching on his knees and digging the sand at the bottom of the tunnel with his hands when the walls around him caved in.

Sand filled the tunnel, trapping his body and leaving only a pocket of air in front of his face.

"It was so tight around me," he said. "At the start I thought it was all right but the air got hot because I was breathing my own air and then I started breathing faster ... I was running out of air, quickly."

He couldn't move his hands to dig himself out. "I thought there weren't enough people to get me out. It was getting tighter and tighter in there."

On the surface his friends, his brother and about 20 members of the public clawed at the sand. As they did so a woman ran to the beach, about 15 minutes away, to get help.

Lifeguard Theo Carrad was near the surf lifesaving towers when the woman arrived at about 3pm and told a club associate that "some kid was buried in a hole and possibly dead".

Mr Carrad and lifeguards Daniel Harvey and Jared Mohan-Druce rushed to the scene on a quad bike while others called for an air ambulance, police and fire.

By the time they arrived a shaken Mr Porter had been freed after six minutes underground. "If it had been any longer I would have passed out," he said.

Mr Carrad said the rescuers had undoubtedly saved Mr Porter's life and he applauded their actions.

He said a person had died at the beach several years ago after being buried trying something similar.

Mr Porter was grateful to everyone who helped get him out. "Without them I would have been dead."

And he said he would not be digging tunnels in the sand again.

West Auckland Sergeant Ian Brenchley said the sand dunes near the lake were very steep - almost at 45-degree angles - making them dangerous at the best of times.

"They are not rolling dunes. People should be discouraged from playing on them or digging in them."