Mother prays, diver saved

Saturday was going to be Yuki Fujita's day to remember. And so it was - for all the wrong reasons.

The 28-year-old from Kobe, Japan, got her much hoped-for working visa in the mail that morning, just in time to start a new job at Wellington Hospital today.

She had a party to go to during the afternoon, and was sure she would catch some big crayfish to take along during the lunchtime dive expedition she was doing with friends off Wellington's south coast.

Instead, she couldn't find her friends or the dive boat after surfacing. She drifted 4.5km paddling for her life wearing her scuba tank and weight belt in heavy seas, at times able to hear a helicopter searching for her far away, and wondering what her mother would think if she drowned.

About the same time, back in Kobe her mother, Mieko Fujita, was visiting the shrine at the family grave to pray, a prayer Mrs Fujita believes helped save her daughter's life.

For after 2 1/2 hours adrift, when Ms Fujita had almost given up and land was out of sight, the police launch Lady Elizabeth III suddenly appeared close by, on its way to the search zone many kilometres away.

"It was my last hope and I yelled 'help, help' and waved my rescue sausage," she said, referring to the bright orange inflatable plastic strip divers carry to draw attention in an emergency.

She was pulled from the water and only then realised how near she had come to death.

"I started shaking and burst into tears and vowed I would never scuba dive again."

Ms Fujita, who came to New Zealand for a working holiday a year ago, is an experienced diver who had made many dives with the group, which included her dive buddy, Brett Bailey.

Buddies are meant to stay together under water. After the group began the dive in 15m Mr Bailey did not see Ms Fujita, but was given a signal by the instructor with them that she had surfaced and was fine, so he continued the dive.

The sea had been rough as they motored to the dive spot, about 500m offshore near the Karori lighthouse, and Ms Fujita had felt ill, so he assumed she'd decided to abandon the dive and stay on the boat.

"It was a mistake among a series of mistakes we made," Mr Bailey said yesterday. "Buddies should never split for a moment and I shouldn't have accepted [the instructor's signal] that she was okay."

When they surfaced 50 minutes later, there was no sign of Ms Fujita.

She had surfaced quickly after reaching the bottom and been unable to see any of her companions. But on the surface she could not see the boat either. She then started paddling for her life.

- NZPA