Coastguard: We don't just save lives, we reunite families
Tuesday, 5 November 2019
OPINION: I’ve been volunteering for Coastguard for nearly 20 years, joining purely by chance after seeing a pop-up stand whilst driving through Hawkes Bay.
In that time, I’ve been part of a number of rescues. There’s always something happening on the water – especially during the busy summer months.
Every year, Coastguard brings around 6,774 people – parents, grandparents, children – home safely to their families. That's an average of 18 people every day.
We once had a swimmer who was about 14 years old that went swimming off Marine Parade in Napier with two mates. Marine Parade in some weathers can be very dangerous and this time, it was quite rough. His friends managed to get back to shore, but he couldn’t fight the undertow and the swell.
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I’d just ordered a meal at a restaurant and got the page. At that point, he’d already been in the water for 40 minutes, so we knew it was an urgent police job.
Everything happens pretty quickly. Once you get the page, you go into autopilot.
We were down at the boat and in the water within 20 minutes.
Luckily, we were able to see him because there were police cars on the beach with the lights on. We threw him a line and pulled him back to the boat, and headed back to reunite him to his family.
It’s moments like these that are particularly memorable. He was such a young kid and the fact it was so quick, and we pulled him out of a dangerous situation and brought him home – we don’t just save lives, we save families.
Sometimes callouts are for things like mechanical mishaps, or a boatie with a leak in their petrol tank. Once, a surfer got swept offshore and we had to work with the Surf and Rescue helicopter to locate him.
He was about 12 kilometres offshore. He was a lucky one.
Two or three times a year we get bigger callouts to boats travelling between Auckland and Wellington, who have run out of diesel and we've had to pull them in.
If there’s one piece of advice I could give Kiwis this summer out on the water, it would be to always be prepared.
1. Check the forecast and stop and think is it safe for me to go?
2. Take and wear your life jacket.
- Have a means of communication – a VHF radio preferably, and a cell phone so if you get into trouble you can communicate.
Never be afraid to give Coastguard a call.
Last year Coastguard New Zealand saved 26 lives and rescued thousands of others who would have rapidly got into worse trouble. You can support the Coastguard by donating here.