Whanganui man says he is lucky to be alive after stabbing at Castlecliff Beach

Jessey Rodgers-Ranginui survived a knife attack at Castlecliff carpark on Guy Fawkes Night. Photo / Bevan Conley

A Whanganui man says he was told by doctors he came within a minute of dying after he was stabbed in an attack by a large group of young people at Castlecliff Beach.

Jessey Rodgers-Ranginui said the incident happened at about midnight on November 5 when he and two of his friends drove to the top carpark at Castlecliff Beach late that night.

“We were just driving out because it was Guy Fawkes night and there’s usually something going on at the beach, like fires and firecrackers and that,” he said.

The carpark was empty save for a group of about 30 young people, he recalled.

“We were there for around a minute, and then they were all around our car.”

Rodgers-Ranginui said he got out of the car to talk to the group, who asked if he and his friends were Black Power members.

When he answered no, the group began to drag his friends from the car.

“I’d just seen that happening, and then next minute I got nine inches to the guts,” he said.

He was stabbed in the right side of the abdomen by one of the group.

He said from that point, his fight or flight instincts kicked in as he tried to save himself and his friends.

The incident took place at the top carpark at Castlecliff Beach. Photo / Bevan Conley

He said they had been whitebaiting earlier in the day, so he grabbed a pole from the car and used it to fend off the attackers.

“They were coming from all directions [and] it was dark, we couldn’t see,” he said.

Using the pole, he said he managed to get to his friends who had been dragged away by other members of the group.

Managing to get one friend into the car, he said he and the other friend came to a standoff with the group, who after getting a few more whacks with the pole started to run away.

“Meanwhile I was just soaking with blood and then we just boosted straight to the hospital.”

Once they got to the hospital, Rodgers-Ranginui said he was put into an induced coma and went into an immediate 6-hour surgery for the life-threatening injuries he’d sustained.

He said doctors told him the stab had cut a major artery and he had lost 3.7 litres of blood by the time he got to the hospital.

He was told if he’d arrived a minute later, he wouldn’t have made it.

“[We’re] lucky we’ve got good surgeons at this hospital, man, I was so lucky,” he said.

Ranginui's post-surgery scar. The knife wound is obscured. Photo / Supplied

He said he spent the next two weeks in the hospital recovering from the surgery.

A police spokesperson said no arrests had been made in relation to the incident and the matter remained under investigation.

Rodgers-Ranginui said he wanted the perpetrators caught and tried for what he considered was attempted murder.

Now back at home, he said there was still a lot of healing ahead.

“It was a freaky moment, I still flashback to it sometimes,” he said.

The injuries and surgery had affected his ability to do some of his hobbies, like whitebaiting.

“Twenty-one days after I got out of surgery, I walked down and tried to set the net and I couldn’t,” he said.

Previously he’d worked as a lifeguard at the beach and had recently been accepted into the Whanganui Coastguard before the incident happened.

“I was a volunteer and I was doing all of the meetings ... I’d just started learning to drive their big boat and was just getting ready for summer,” he said.

While he’d been able to return to the beach since the attack, he hadn’t been able to return to work and had to pull out of working for Coastguard for the time being.

Rodgers-Ranginui said he thought the group who attacked him had congregated at the carpark due to a party that had happened in the neighbourhood earlier that night.

“We were just in the wrong place at the wrong time ... it was going to happen to anybody that night,” he said.