Tragic last trip
Outgoing Tauranga mayor says death of his good friend was ‘quite unbelievable’
Stuart Pedersen had almost made it home.
The well-known Tauranga sailor and Act party candidate was travelling back from a trip around the Pacific Islands with wife, Pamela, her brother-in-law Steve, and fellow Tauranga sailor Bruce Goodwin.
They were travelling in the Pedersens’ 14m yacht Essence; a vessel they had planned to sell after this last trip.
The sailors had nearly reached Cape Brett in Northland when the yacht began filling with water in turbulent seas about 37km off the coast around 1pm on Monday.
When they went to activate the liferaft, it blew away in 40- to 50-knot winds.
As the yacht sank around them, Goodwin activated his personal locator beacon, sparking a dramatic rescue.
But Stuart Pedersen, an accomplished sailor who had previously taken his family around the world in a yacht, did not survive.
Pamela Pedersen was taken to Whanga¯ rei Hospital in a critical condition but was yesterday moved into a ward.
Goodwin and Pamela’s brotherin-law were moderately hurt but were discharged yesterday.
Outgoing Tauranga mayor Greg Brownless was grief-stricken when he spoke with the Bay of Plenty
Times yesterday, saying the death of his friend was “quite unbelievable”.
“It’s a dreadful thing. Stuart was a great guy involved in the [Bay of Plenty Sailing Academy Trust], taking kids from underprivileged backgrounds and giving them an experience they otherwise would not have gotten,” Brownless said.
“He’s a very compassionate
person. I’ve always admired him for the years I’ve known him.”
Brownless and Pedersen, who shared a love for sailing, met through involvement in their Rotary club and had breakfast together every Friday.
“That was before he went off on his island journey.”
Pedersen’s boat was coming back from Fiji on Monday. He had invited Brownless to join him in sailing around the islands but Brownless had other commitments, including last weekend’s local body elections.
“To think of his sailing around the world and to be taken just off the coast of New Zealand, nearly at home, it’s horrendous. You can’t believe it. It’s like a very, very bad dream.”
On Monday afternoon, rescue services battled choppy seas and strong winds to reach the group. About 2.45pm, an Air Force Orion found the group floating in 5m to 6m swells and dropped a raft.
Mark Cannell, chief crewman for the Auckland Westpac Rescue Helicopter, described the conditions during the 20-minute rescue as “the second worst I have been out in, in 15 or 16 years”.
The waves were so big they broke over the two survivors in the liferaft, while the other two were in the water.
“Once we were down at winching height [21m] they were pretty significant walls of water.”
The crew winched Stuart up first, followed by Pamela. But getting the others out wasn’t easy as the liferaft was being thrown around by the waves.
“We just had to ensure that we got the medic in the right place.”
They had to anticipate the raft’s movement, without the pilot — hovering about 25m above — being able to see what was going on.
Meanwhile, one of the chopper’s sea swimmers was on the raft trying to hook on to the winch.
“With that kind of sea state you can’t keep tension on the winch cable, so of course as soon as the swell drops away, if you don’t have enough slack then they get plucked out whether they’re ready to go or not.”
Yesterday Act leader David Seymour said party members were in shock over Pedersen’s death. He stood as a candidate in Tauranga in the 2014 and 2017 elections but was unsuccessful.
Seymour called Pedersen an “incredibly kind and hospitable man”.
Bay of Plenty Act candidate Bruce Carley said he and Pedersen had been “very good friends”.
Carley’s voice cracked as he said: “He would have died making sure he saved the lives of his wife Pamela and loved ones.”
Pedersen’s two adult sons, Theo and Sven, are now flying back to New Zealand from overseas.
Pedersen and Goodwin were members of the Tauranga Yacht and Power Boat Club.
Club commodore Andy Knowles said “Stuart was basically the guy who ran [the sailing trust]. He put a lot of money into it as well. He had an extremely generous nature and if someone donated some money to it, he would match it every time.”
Investigations on what caused the yacht to sink are ongoing.