Weekend water happenings

Our first callout was at 1130 this morning, to a 6.5m runabout that had run out of petrol on the way home from a fishing trip in the outer Gulf & was anchored east of North Channel. As we made our way through about 30 anchored boats in the Channel, we expected this wasn't going to be our only outing today.

We were quickly alongside the runabout, he lifted his anchor, the crew had it quickly hooked onto the tow rope and away we went, back towards Buckelton's Bay, where we unhooked and pushed the boat into shallow enough water that he didn't get his shorts wet.

Nice one crew of Bruce, Rob & Donn.

Back to Sandspit, refuel, clean up and start a sweep-stake on when the next page is going to come.

Ops didn't disappoint and paged us out at 1630, so Len didn't get to watch the rugby! (Sorry Len)

This task was to a young guy on a SeaDoo that had filled with water so had been beached on Motuora Island before it sank. Unfortunately, he didn't know what part was leaking, but suspected the jet seal.

On arrival we hooked the PWC onto our tow rope, took an extra passenger on board and swiveled the ski off the beach via towing it from the bow fairlead.

Once it was floating - although very low in the water - we pulled it alongside, removed the covers then managed to fit our whale pump suction - the arm powered one - into the engine compartment of the jetski.

Our crew and the owner were busy pumping it continuously while we barged it alongside us to Martin's Bay, the closest boat ramp.

We'd added some fenders for flotation in case we couldn't keep up with water coming in, but all went well and we pulled into Martin's Bay 30 mins later, just as the jet ski trailer was being delivered from Orewa.

This operator also managed to get ashore with dry shorts and we packed our gear away and headed home.

Thanks to Bruce, Rob & Len for this one. A perfectly calm, clear night on the water....unless you wanted to watch the rugby...!