Boat-owner's holiday goes up in smoke

A summer boating holiday ended yesterday in a cloud of black smoke and two burned-out shells on the side of the road.

An Auckland man and his two children fled their four-wheel-drive Range Rover and 5.5m boat as they were engulfed by flames on the road from Tairua to Thames.

Carrick Graham said smoke started pouring from the dashboard of the Range Rover about 7km from Thames.

He pulled over and tried to unhitch the motor boat, which he had bought not long before Christmas.

"But I could see burning rubber dripping down from the engine underneath," he said.

Mr Graham, son of former National Party Cabinet minister Sir Douglas Graham, decided to abandon the car and boat. "I had to bloody get out of there," he said.

The fire set 100 litres of boat fuel alight, and black smoke was soon billowing into the air.

"It [the craft] was very quickly engulfed in smoke and explosions," Mr Graham said.

Other travellers said they heard a series of blasts.

The insured boat and car - worth $60,000 - were left as burned-out shells. "The main thing was just getting the kids out of there," Mr Graham said.

Caroline Dally said she pulled over when she saw the flames in the boat.

"Before our eyes, the fire engulfed the boat and the tyres popped out. There were more mini explosions," Ms Dally said.

Mr Graham said his 10-year-old daughter and 8-year-old son were shaken but happy to get home.

"The boat was fantastic. We had been to the beach, out long-lining, and we had fishing rods on the boat ... We lost all the gear in the back of the car," he said.

Mr Graham, who works in public relations, said the fire was "good practice for the New Year".

"I deal in crisis management, and it is somewhat ironic that it involved me," he said.

He praised the work of the firefighters and police who arrived at the scene within minutes, despite the heavy traffic and the fact that the area did not have cellphone coverage.

About 30 firefighters fought the blaze, which spread to nearby scrub on Department of Conservation land.

Four fire engines and two water tankers were called to help put out the fire - a job that took more than two hours.

"We had to hit it fairly hard," Thames fire station officer Ken Brokenshire said.

He said there had been no rain in the region for a while. "She was pretty dry."

Mr Brokenshire said the fire was probably started by an electrical fault in the Range Rover. The incident caused a backlog of traffic as holiday-makers returned home from the Coromandel.

"It was like an Auckland motorway," Mr Brokenshire said.

Constable Ian Cornelius said the traffic backed up to the Whangamata turn-off, about 10km from the fire.