An Auckland teenager spent 18 hours clinging to a liferaft off the coast of Brazil after her ship capsized.

A New Zealander was one of 64 people rescued from a Canadian sailing ship, filled with high school and university students, that sunk off the coast of Brazil.

Two people were rescued after leaping into the water from a burning launch off Mayor Island in the Bay of Plenty today.

Rescue services were flat-out with 25 callouts by 5pm yesterday.

The Princess Ashika was an old "rust bucket" and he had not revised a memorandum of agreement for purchasing the vessel, the man who was company secretary of the Shipping Corporation of Polynesia has told a Tongan royal commission.

A set of freak conditions conspired to catch 15 children in a rip yesterday, prompting a major rescue effort.

One fisherman drowned and three others spent hours clinging to their boat after it capsized in the mouth of the Manukau Harbour.

The crew of a NZ trimaran harassing Japanese whalers in the Southern Ocean had to be rescued after their boat was allegedly rammed and sunk by a Japanese ship, anti-whaling group Sea Shepherd Conservation Society says.

Surf lifesavers are pleading with the public to take care in the water after a spate of drownings.

A fisherman whose boat sank in the middle of the night was so determined not to surrender it that he swam the waterlogged vessel nearly 1km to safety.

Fifteen minutes before the Princess Ashika sank with the loss of 74 lives, passengers were asked to help bail, a survivor has said,