‘IT’S JUST SOUL DESTROYING’
Father and son, 10, went missing Friday foraging for pa¯ ua
•Police hunting for a missing 10-year-old and his dad recovered two bodies last night off the Wairarapa coast.
• The pair vanished while snorkelling for paua after they were separated from two other close family members.
•Search and Rescue leader Sergeant Tony Matheson (right) said police were working to support the distraught family.
• Six people have already drowned over the holiday period — two more than last year — marking a tragic start to the summer.
Two bodies were found yesterday evening by divers searching for a father and son who failed to return to shore from snorkelling for pa¯ ua off the Wairarapa coast.
A 49-year-old Masterton man and his 10-year-old son were lost on Friday morning while searching for the shellfish about 50m offshore.
The body of a man was found first, at about 4.30pm, by the Police National Dive Squad near Mataikona where the pair went missing.
A boy’s body was found a short time later. Both were on the sea floor.
While formal identification is yet to take place, police believe the two deceased are the father and son reported missing after failing to return from a snorkelling trip, Sergeant Tony Matheson, the search and rescue co-ordinator, said
The man’s partner and the boy’s mother was among a big group of family members and friends waiting on the beach.
Police are working to support the family, who are distraught at the loss of their loved ones, Matheson said.
The discovery came after the dive squad concentrated on a channel not far from shore where the father and son were last seen.
While the exact circumstances were not clear, Matheson said they were in a reef system on an outgoing tide and were not using fins.
He said they may have been pushed by the tide into rougher water and not wearing fins made it hard to get back to shore.
Matheson said the deceased are from a family that is well known in the area.
“They are a lovely family. It is just awful.”
The discovery of the bodies came after a big effort from professionals and volunteers and involved Westpac and Amalgamated helicopters, commercial and recreational boaties and fishers.
The alarm was raised after another adult family member returned to the beach earlier than planned because of rough conditions.
A search soon after they went missing by rescue helicopters and about 10 nearby fishing boats at Castlepoint found no sign of them.
Matheson had earlier acknowledged the chance of finding them alive was slim.
“Everyone here who is experienced in searches of this type has no illusions as to where this is potentially heading, but at the same time we are reluctant to take hope away.”
Tangata whenua in the area have placed a ra¯hui from Whakataki River mouth north to Mataikona River and 12km out to sea.
“It’s a very close family group. It’s just soul destroying really for those involved,” Matheson said.
The missing father and son were part of a family group of four who had driven from Masterton about an hour to the west. The pair became lost off the Mataikona rocks after the third diver returned to shore.