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The 9-year-old survivor of a nightmare fishing trip was swept more than a kilometre down a channel in the Manukau Harbour before spending hours in the dark clinging to his dead mother whom he assumed was sleeping peacefully.
Police last night confirmed the identities of the deceased - 43-year-old Cook Islander Tangatavai Tania Mataora and her 6-year-old granddaughter Maeva Precious Mataora - who drowned on the mudflats at Waiau Pa, 51km south-west of Auckland in the early hours of yesterday morning.
Tangatavai's husband Grand, who had the only torch among the four, spent hours searching for his family after hearing the children screaming in the dark. Police said early indications were that Tangatavai and the two children were caught in the dark by the incoming tide and were swept down the estuary by the current, which can reach speeds of five knots. "The water comes behind you and you cannot get back," said Sergeant Dene Duthie of the Police Search and Rescue.
Grand had heard the children's screams, but with only a small flashlight was helpless to find them. "He is quite distraught. He has lost his wife and grandkid," said Duthie.
"It would have been terrifying in the dark, trying to cling to the kids and save herself as well," Duthie said of the grandmother's ordeal.
Frantic with worry and fearing the worst, Grand ran 2km to a nearby farmhouse where he raised the alarm at 4am.
The Westpac rescue helicopter using night vision equipment, and a police search and rescue team were thwarted by the darkness. "With that night vision gear they could have picked up a cigarette lighter or a cellphone five miles away. If only [the family] had had a small torch the chances of them being found would have been a lot higher," Duthie said.
Eventually, around 9am yesterday the police Eagle helicopter found the woman and two children on mudflats about 1.5km from the point they had become separated from Grand.
The woman was face down in the mud, with her son next to her body. The dead girl was located nearby. "The boy thought Mum was asleep. It's very sad," Duthie said.
Last night Maeva's father, Luke Mataora, spoke to the Herald on Sunday saying the tragedy had hit the tight-knit family hard.
He recalled the moment yesterday when the news first broke his daughter was missing. "'They've got no chance', that's what came into my mind. I just felt lost."
Police, however, said the deaths of Tangatavai and Maeva were completely avoidable.
Had the South Auckland family been wearing lifejackets, been equipped with torches and been able to swim they would not have come to grief.
"Instead, two people are dead and dad and boy will have to live with that for the rest of their lives," said Duthie.
Last night Luke Mataora refused to blame his father for the death of his daughter.
Although what had happened was a terrible tragedy, he said he was "glad" Maeva had been with her grandmother at the time and had not died alone.
"I call her Miss Pukapuka. She was energetic, always on the move. She just doesn't sit down."
The boy, Grand Mataora Jnr, was last night too traumatised to speak to police. He would be spoken to in time but police said they had to be "careful of his well-being".
"It will be a long time healing," said another of the officers investigating the deaths.
In emotional scenes yesterday, mud-slicked police officers had to struggle through mangroves and bush to bring the two bodies across farmland after they had been located.
A teary-eyed Duthie maintained it had been a difficult search and rescue operation, made tougher by the incoming tide and the fact the missing group had no torches or lifejackets.
He questioned whether a 6-year-old should even have been taken out floundering at that time of night.
Grand Mataora did not want to be interviewed last night, but his brother Willy Mataora said the tragedy had devastated the large family.
His sister-in-law was "a giving lady" who would always feed hungry kids in the area, he said.
She and Grand, whom Willy Mataora described as "a good fisherman" had been together for years and had a happy marriage.
Their granddaughter Maeva was a little tomboy who enjoyed the outdoors and riding her bike.
Rob Nelson, a commercial fisherman and Manukau Harbour flounder spearing expert, said his advice to anyone going out fishing at night was to visit the site in daylight first.
"You should never go out blind. You need to go during the day, check out where the channels and the firm ground is, it's a commonsense thing."
Nelson said flounder spearing should always be done with the tide halfway in, never alone, and every person should carry a lamp.
"There should always be two of you with a lamp each. If one fails, there's always another, and you always stay together."
- Michelle Coursey and Rebecca Milne
