Maritime NZ chasing man whose hoax cost $28,000

Maritime New Zealand wants to find the man whose hoax mayday call sparked a search and rescue operation off Whangarei that cost $28,160 of vital emergency funds.

The Coastguard, police, Northland Electricity rescue helicopter, Navy ship Pukaki, a fixed-wing aircraft and the Rescue Co-ordination Centre in Wellington all sprang into action after the mayday call was made during appalling weather about 1am on August 14.

The male caller said he was the skipper of a boat named East Coaster, with four others on board, and the vessel was in trouble between the Hen and Chicken Islands.

The call sparked a search that put rescuers' lives at risk and cost $28,160.

The Royal New Zealand Navy was also involved but it does not charge the National Rescue Co-ordination Centre for search and rescue support.

Maritime NZ spokesman Nigel Clifford said searchers' lives were needlessly endangered because somebody thought it was a good idea to make the hoax call.

Mr Clifford said Maritime NZ had an annual operating budget of around $800,000 and the callout was a waste of taxpayers' money, which could have been spent on real emergencies.

If the culprit was caught Maritime NZ would take action against him and hopefully recover some of the wasted search costs.

The agency had received 23 hoax emergency callouts since 2004 but this incident was the only one that had incurred any costs, as staff could usually determine within minutes if a call was genuine.

"But this was a particularly difficult one. It was quite plausible and the weather was atrocious at the time, so we had to take it seriously," Mr Clifford said.

Whangarei Coastguard skipper Dave Gray said at the time that the search was conducted amid some of the worst sea conditions he had searched in during his nine years' service.

President John Haselden said the coastguard crew had to treat the call as genuine and it was disappointing it turned out to be a hoax as it had put the lives of the rescuers at risk.

Mr Haselden said the organisation was always needing funds and hoax callouts did not help.

- NORTHERN ADVOCATE