Katikati fisherman's harbour chase

Katikati fisherman Shaun Hardy looked up from checking a lifejacket he found floating near the Bowentown entrance on Tuesday afternoon to see a boatload of angry islanders waving their arms at him.

It sparked a ‘boat rage' incident that resulted in Shaun being chased across the harbor almost as far as Katikati, before the pursuing boat either ran out of fuel or broke down.


Shaun Hardy's bad experience on Tuesday has him thinking of fishing somewhere else. Photo: Chris Callinan

'I pulled the rope on the lifejacket and realized there was a net attached,” says Shaun. 'As I was letting the rope back out – you can't just throw it back because it might foul around the outboard – I looked up and, crikey! About 100 metres away were these islanders all waving their arms.

'And I thought, ‘this is probably not a good situation'.

'So I just said to them: ‘Mate I didn't know what it was, it didn't have a name on it. This is against the law.' And then they just started threatening me.

'And I thought, ‘I'm outta here'.”

Their boat looked like a 14ft (4.2m) open top fiberglass hull with a very old 25hp white outboard.

'It could have been a really old Evinrude,” says Shaun. 'It did have side panels on it, either a Johnson or an Evinrude. The hull was a light-ish blue and the deck was white.

'I would imagine because there were five big islanders on it that they've come from Anzac Bay. I have seen groups of islanders there before, and they have been drag-netting in Anzac Bay.”

There are rules about set nets, says Shaun. The float must be identifiable, and marked with the name and phone number of the net's owner, and there is a minimum requirement for letter size.

The boat with five men on board followed Shaun as he motored away. Shaun crossed to the other side of the harbour toward Ongare Point, where there was another boat and a witness if they continued the chase.

'They stopped about half-way across the harbour and went back to their net and dropped off three people on the island,” says Shaun.

'Then two of them came back over to where I was. At that point I rang police.”

At 20-25 knots (37-46km/h) they went past Kauri Point, and had almost reached the Beach Road boat ramp before Shaun saw a puff of steam out the back of the pursuing boat – and they stopped.

Shaun turned back towards Tanners Point where he had arranged to meet police.

'As far as I know there were three people stranded on Matakana Island, two people stranded in a broken down boat in the middle of the harbour – and it's getting dark,” says Shaun. 'It was a little bit of sweet justice really.”

The Katikati constable that met Shaun at Tanners Point is on days off. The Waihi Beach Volunteer Coastguard has no record of any call-out on Tuesday afternoon.

A police spokesman says they received a report of disorder in the water on Tuesday afternoon, involving a boat with 2-5 men on board. Their identities remain unknown.

Police says they will do everything possible to identify the parties involved and follow the investigation through to its conclusion.

Police advise anyone who finds themselves in a similar situation to this to ring111, head to the nearest accessible landmark and wait for police assistance.

Shaun says it was a scary experience, and it is putting him off fishing the northern harbour now that they know what his boat looks like.

'My obligation is to make it known,” says Shaun. 'If this has happened to me, the chances are it will happen to someone else - or it already has.”

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3 comments

Islanders?

Posted on 01-09-2016 13:43 | By Sam Green

What does that mean?


Stupid question Sam Green

Posted on 01-09-2016 23:06 | By CC8

what do you think it means? Somebody who lives on an Island, or came from an island.


At it

Posted on 03-09-2016 07:14 | By overit

It would seem the 'intimidators' are at it again.


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