Car stolen and dumped in harbour, but nobody noticed

The stolen car was dragged from the Manukau Harbour after a fisherman attached a salvage truck's cable to it. Picture / David Blinman

Duncan and Barbara Backshall were surprised when the Papatoetoe police phoned to tell them their station wagon had just been pulled out of the Manukau Harbour.

Their surprise was not at its being found, or at its being dumped in the harbour, but that it was missing in the first place.

"I was surprised, especially as I thought it was parked outside our house," said Mr Backshall.

The 1993 Mitsubishi V3000 was parked on the road when the Backshalls went to bed on Sunday night. They did not check on it yesterday as they had two other cars they use.

It had been stolen during the night, possibly crashed, and then dumped into the harbour by the old Mangere Bridge.

Freelance photographer David Blinman arrived at the harbour to see the rear of the car sticking out of the water, about 25m from the shore.

He said it appeared the car had been pushed down the boat ramp and taken out by the tide.

Mr Blinman said a fisherman took a cable out to the car, which was then winched to shore by a heavy salvage towing company.

It had panel damage that appeared to be from an accident, and the dashboard had been pulled out.

The car is insured, and is likely to be written off because of the water damage.

Last year, more than 36,000 cars were stolen in New Zealand. Police recovered 7845 of them.