'Help. Is this going to fill up with water?' - separate marine rescues across NZ ring in 2019

Mark Grieve was driving the 6m Hartley boat in Lake Wakatipu off Sunshine Bay about 7pm on Monday when it started taking on water.

The panic was fleeting but real for Kevin Glucina when his motorboat abruptly died on Hauraki Gulf yesterday and a flooded engine room confronted him below deck.

The Matakana-based boatie, with 20 years' experience on the water, was travelling from Great Barrier Island to Kawau Island, about 60km north of Auckland, when unexplained "sudden engine failure" struck.

"Initially when it happened, we didn't know how much water we were taking on," Glucina said.

"There was water in the engine room, we couldn't determine where it was coming from.

"It's one of those things when you're going across water and all of a sudden the motor stops and the boat comes to a sudden halt.

"There is a moment of 'uh oh, what's next? Help'. Is this going to fill up with water very quickly?"

Glucina was on board his 26-ft launch with his wife Christina and, after assessing the amount of water seeping on board, made the decision to send a pan pan call to Coastguard Northern Region at 10.30am.

A pan pan call is a less urgent call for help than a mayday, suitable when there is no immediate threat to life.

"After 20 minutes we realised we weren't taking a lot of water on, but the engine wouldn't restart," Glucina said.

"We never really got to a point where we were ready to abandon ship. There was only probably three or four inches of water in the engine room."

However, the drama of the day had not ended for the Glucinas.

The initial Kawau rescue vessel coastguard sent from Sandspit, Warkworth, blew its own engine on the way to the stranded launch's location just off Little Barrier Island.

Another vessel from North Shore Rescue was eventually sent, and by 12.45pm the Glucinas were being towed back to Sandspit.

"It's good to know they're there, conditions were a little rough out there today so all of a sudden when things stop it's good to know you've got such a great service as New Zealand coastguard to rescue you if you end up in the water," Glucina said.

"Fortunately, it didn't happen to us today, but it can quite easily."

It's been a hairy New Year's period elsewhere on the water across New Zealand.

Josh Jamieson and father Gary Jamieson were pulled from the ocean after their boat capsized in Golden Bay on Monday morning. Photo / Supplied

An Auckland father and son were pulled out of the water on Monday after a large wave swamped their vessel north of Golden Bay's Collingwood Bar, on the northern tip of the South Island.

"It wasn't exactly the father-son bonding day I was hoping for," said Josh Jamieson, 33, who was pulled out of the ocean along with his 65-year-old father Gary Jamieson.

"Before we knew it, the boat was under and we were just hanging on."

With their radio failing to work, his father was luckily able to reach for a mobile phone stored in a waterproof case and call his wife for help.

He estimated the pair, fitted with lifejackets, spent nearly an hour clinging to the boat, which was floating just 20cm above the water level.

Local volunteers reached them first, before Nelson Marlborough Rescue Helicopter took his father to hospital.

Also in Queenstown on New Year's Eve, a father and three children had ''less than a minute'' to abandon ship, after a section of their 6m Hartley boat gave way underneath the motor.

''It's a timely reminder. We were joking and laughing about it last night but in reality it was a close call," said Mark Grieve, who was steering the ship in Lake Wakatipu off Sunshine Bay.

''We were in that water about 35 minutes. Fortunately, they all had lifejackets on, the kids had wetsuits and lifejackets on."

The five were eventually rescued by operators of a commercial jet-boat and taken to shore.