David Blayney and two mates were rescued from the Hauraki Gulf after a fishing trip went wrong. Photo / Supplied
David Blayney and two mates were rescued from the Hauraki Gulf after a fishing trip went wrong. Photo / Supplied
A group of fishermen had only two minutes to grab items that would help them stay afloat after their boat began to sink in the Hauraki Gulf.
Within 30 minutes of being called out, a combination of the Maritme Police, Coastguard and the Auckland Westpac Rescue Helicopter rescued the threemen out of the water as they clung to a chilly bin holding Coke cans and muesli bars with their boat at the bottom of the ocean.
On Saturday panelbeater David Blayney and his two friends embarked on a fishing trip from Hatfields Beach about 40km north of Auckland.
Blayney said the trio embarked on his boat, named Yosemite Sam after the Looney Tunes character, in the morning, heading to a fishing spot.
Auckland Westpac Rescue Helicopter locates three male patients in the water after their small boat capsized.
The trio began throwing out items that floated, chilly bins, coke cans and muesli bars.
Three men were rescued after their tinnie sunk on Saturday morning north of Big Manly, Whangaparaoa. Photo / Auckland Westpac Rescue Helicopter.
The three friends once all worked in the same place and had remained close since they went their separate ways, he said.
"We'd only been out half an hour, we didn't get very far at all."
They did not panic, in fact, the first phone call was not made to emergency services, but instead one of their wives, Blayney said.
Water that had splashed on their phones meant that they could only access recently used contacts, so a wife of one of the friends was called and then she called the Coastguard.
