Three people were rescued after a high-stakes nighttime rescue in “trying conditions”, hundreds of kilometres off the coast of New Zealand last night.
At around 2.30pm yesterday, Maritime NZ’s rescue coordination centre was notified that a launch bound for Tonga from New Zealand had encountered trouble south of the Kermadec Islands — about 350 nautical miles north-east of New Zealand.
A mayday was declared shortly after, and the crew decided to abandon the launch for a life raft.
“They took life jackets, a grab bag and other essential supplies. They gave themselves the best chance of survival,” search and rescue officer at RCCNZ Taylor Monaghan said.
“After getting their emergency position — indicating radio beacon coordinates following its activation — it was clear they were a long way from help.”
Monaghan said it was a “high-stakes” rescue operation.
A mayday call was relayed to vessels within a 200 nautical mile area by the maritime operations centre.
The only vessel in the area was a merchant oil tanker, which changed course to the location of the call.
An NZDF P8 was also sent, reaching the life raft six hours after the first call for help.
The aircraft monitored the life raft and coordinated with the tanker as it was “steaming to render assistance”.
Aboard the tanker, the crew readied for the rescue.
“Getting on board a large vessel on the open ocean from a life raft is not an easy task,” Monaghan said.
The tanker had to use multiple ladders to reach the life raft. It also needed to manoeuvre carefully alongside the much smaller raft.
“This was done at night, in trying conditions as well,” Monaghan said.
At around 11pm, RCCNZ was notified that the crew had been successfully rescued and were aboard the merchant ship.
RCCNZ general manager Justin Allen, who monitored the search, said it was a “big relief” to know the crew was safe and was “immensely proud” of the search and rescue officers involved as well as the crews of the P8 and oil tanker.
“This was a complex rescue, and very good result to get the three safely off the life raft and onto the merchant vessel,” he says.