A tramper has been swept away while trying to cross a stream on the Milford Track.

The parents of the German teenagers presumed drowned in Foveaux Strait are returning home and say they know they are leaving their daughters behind.

Deep in a glacier crevasse with a broken arm and ankle, Sabine Hellenbrandt expected to take her last breath trapped in the ice. Then she heard members of the South Westland Alpine Cliff Rescue call to her.

A kayaker trying to traverse "car-sized boulders" on a trip in the eastern Bay of Plenty sparked a helicopter call-out after slipping and falling into a river.

A French tourist swept away after slipping into a raging Woolshed Creek late on Wednesday was washed over a terrifying two waterfalls before clambering out.

A search is under way in South Westland for a Nelson woman who has not been heard from in eight days.

Stuck in a rip and being swept out to sea, Ricky Robinson was gasping for air in between throwing up water and being tossed under monster waves.

Three women were spared from spending a night lost in the Kaimai Ranges after being rescued overnight.

A man is in hospital with suspected spinal and chest injuries after tumbling about 30m down a bank while hunting.

It was like MacGyver meets Rescue 1 when a tramper found a badly injured man lying in a stream in the Waitakere Ranges.

Auckland Mayor Len Brown has voted to slash funding to the Westpac rescue helicopter service, three days after assuring the service he would sort out a $900,000 funding gap.

The Auckland Council has approved a $14.3 million funding package for 10 regional amenities, which includes a cut for the Westpac helicopter rescue service.

Police searchers have been scouring a small area off the Coromandel coastline for an oil slick in their hunt for a small biplane that disappeared after take off yesterday morning.

A teenager who became trapped on a steep bluff in the Waitakere Ranges in darkness used the screen light from his cellphone to guide rescuers.

Auckland's rescue helicopter service claims it has been starved of money - but it turns out to be much better off than its fellow charities.

The hunt for four men missing in four separate incidents across New Zealand continues today.

Len Brown has called for a funding board at the centre of a row with the Auckland Rescue Helicopter Trust to be scrapped after its push to slash funding for the trust.

Members of a board which yesterday agreed to halve funding to the Auckland Rescue Helicopter Trust could find themselves in court.