Police were called to the river near Graham Island, in Hamilton, about 3.30pm last Saturday. Photo / Dan Hutchinson
The last two words from a young man before being swept away in the Waikato River were, “Help me”.
Teananga Tiotia, 25, vanished after getting into trouble while swimming near Graham Island in Hamilton last Saturday.
After a three-day river search, police found his body on Monday morning.
Tiotia’s adoptive father, Tiotia Kaueata Moote, told the Herald his son was raised in the Kiribati Islands, and was a “pretty good swimmer”.
“We are surrounded by the ocean and the sea. We learn [to swim] when we are kids,” he said.
He claimed the water flowing through the Waikato River is different.
Tiotia went out with a group of about eight for a swim when he and another friend decided to swim across the river to the other side.
His friend made it to the riverbank but Tiotia did not.
“Teananga nearly reached the other side, but suddenly, he was stuck in a whirlpool,” Moote said.
“The current was pretty strong ... Teananga was going down, going up, and struggling to come up.”
Moote was told by his friends it looked like “someone pulled his leg from underwater” and when he resurfaced from underwater the first time, he shouted, “Help, help me”.
The second time, “he was just gone and never came up”.
“This was the last time they saw his face,” he said.
Tiotia’s friend on the other side was only about “six feet away” from Tiotia, so he tried to reach him.
However, the water was “too strong”.
“He started going down too and decided to come back because it’s too late,” Moote said.
“He didn’t want to die too, so he tried to save himself.
“Teananga was already gone.”
His friend group on the other side were “too far away” to reach him, and that’s when emergency services, as well as Moote, were called.
The following days were filled with searching and sleepless nights, especially for Moote’s wife – Tiotia’s biological sister.
The couple adopted him and brought him to New Zealand just over two years ago for a “better life”.
“All she did was cry and yell out to Teananga, saying he would be cold by now. She didn’t want to use blankets because of it,” he said.
Moote searched for his son, in his own boat, twice a day.
The second day was when the disappearance hit him.
“I put my boat in the water, and I’m calling his name. All my tears [were] coming down ... I didn’t know [if] I’m ever going to find him,” Moote said.
The third day, while on the river doing his daily search, he got the call from his wife that Tiotia had been found, and the family needed to identify the body.
“[His] face looked different ... he was still the same, just some scratches and swelling, but he changed a little bit,” Moote said.
“I was pretty sad. I know he’s gone forever, but I still don’t believe that.”
The passing of Tiotia has been hard on the family, especially for his brother, who was present on the day of the incident and tried to save him.
Moote said you can see on his face that he’s “not like before”.
“They’ve always shared one room, they go out together, they go shopping together, and they go with their friends together. It’s really sad for him.”
Tiotia was a “very respectful kid”.
“I always admired him because he really respected my wife. When she growled him, he always listened,” Moote said.
“I really miss him.”
Teananga Tiotia will be laid to rest on Monday.
Police were called to the river near Graham Island, in Hamilton, about 3.30pm on Saturday, after a report of a struggling swimmer being swept downstream.
Despite extensive search efforts over the weekend, Tiotia had not been located until Monday morning.
While searching for Tiotia, police also found the body of Aydan Brown, who had gone missing from a Chartwell address five months ago.
Brown’s family invited Moote’s to the site yesterday on River Rd, where Brown was pulled out of the water, for a karakia.
“They believe that [Teananga] brought back [Aydan] with him because the reason their son was found was because of Teananga.”
Malisha Kumar is a multimedia journalist based in Hamilton. She joined the Waikato Herald in 2023 after working for Radio 1XX in Whakatāne.