Kiribati authorities have confirmed a small canoe found in the Pacific Ocean was that which six young people were in when they were swept away.

A RNZAF Orion has failed to find any sign of six young people missing in a small craft in the Pacific.

The wreckage of former Olympian Geoff Smale's microlight was found on Mount Duppa in the Bryant Range.

Police have named a Sydney woman who died after falling over 400 metres down a slippery ice face in the Fiordland National Park. She had planned to celebrate her 39th birthday. It was left to rescuers to tell the woman's husband of her fate

An Aussie man who fell 40m down a slippery ice face with his wife while climbing in the Fiordland National Park....

Three boaties who spent the night in Cook Strait could have been rescued much sooner.

Both of the men missing after their small boat capsized off Wellington's south coast last night have been found alive.

A couple were forced to spend a 'tough' night out in the open after abandoning their boat in rough seas off southern Fiordland.

The search for 17 fishermen missing in the Southern Ocean has been suspended as no further survivors are expected.

Five people are dead and 17 missing after a Korean fishing vessel sank in the freezing waters of the Southern Ocean, 2700km south east of Bluff, early this morning.

An RNZAF Orion has been taken off the search for a New Zealander lost overboard in the Pacific Ocean as hopes of his survival fade.

The flight instructor who died in a helicopter crash "ate, drank and slept" aviation, a friend says.

The bodies of an instructor and a trainee pilot were this afternoon removed from the wreckage of the helicopter which crashed into Bluff Harbour yesterday.

The helicopter missing since yesterday has been found submerged in Bluff Harbour along with the bodies of the chopper's two crew.

A major search underway in Southland for a missing helicopter with a pilot and instructor on board will continue into the night.