"He [the commercial boat] would have been 20 minutes away," the man said, adding that he had been told that the operator of that boat routinely responded to calls for help by turning his radio off.
He also disputed two of the reported facts - he and his brother-in-law, from Whangarei, who owned the boat, had launched at Scott Point, not Te Paki Stream, and they had not come ashore at Te Waiawa Bay. He had struck out for shore before the boat flipped, and was then followed by his companion.
They had clambered on to rocks then climbed some 30 or 40 metres, up a cliff and around a hill, to where their partners stood watching.
The pair had not been fishing, but had set out for Cape Maria van Diemen before heading back to Scott Point. Conditions had not been "that bad", he said. The swell had been a little over a metre although it did increase. Every 10 or 15 minutes they encountered a bigger set, but apart from that conditions had been relatively calm.
They had found themselves in difficulty when their motor failed.
He also rejected reports that police had been trying to locate them. They had given the police two phone numbers, he said, and he had been at the Kaitaia police station on Wednesday, "and nothing was mentioned".