The surviving deckhand who was working on board the Enchanter when it sank killing five men has described the moment the fatal wave struck.
Kobe O’Neill continued giving evidence this morning at the Whangārei District Court in the trial of skipper Lance Goodhew who is charged with breaching the Health and Safety Work Act.
O’Neill told the court: “It was like being hit by a train."
Maritime New Zealand alleges Goodhew failed to take reasonable care and in doing so exposed passengers to a risk of death or serious injury.
Goodhew is defending the charges against him.
Passengers Mark Sanders, Richard Bright, Mike Lovett, Geoff Allen and Mark Walker died after the boat they had chartered was struck by a rogue wave near North Cape at the tip of the North Island in March 2022. It was meant to be a “trip of a lifetime” for the group.
The vessel was returning from a fishing trip to the Three Kings Islands / Manawatāwhi when it hit bad weather and rolled over in March 2022. (Source: 1News)
O’Neill, who was 20 at the time of the accident, said on the day the weather had been improving all afternoon. He’d gone to prepare dinner in the galley when the wave hit.
He said he was alerted to the impact by a “sudden thud of the wave and being thrown over”.
He said he wasn’t initially able to get off the boat, but the roof came off and it enable him to escape.
O’Neill and other survivors used a piece of the fly-bridge as a form of flotation. They played a game of I-spy while waiting in the water to keep their minds off what was going on.
Eventually, he said he told the other survivors: “I-spy with my little eye something beginning with 'H'.” It was an 'H' for helicopter.
Enchanter sinking trial: 'The whole boat turned upside down'
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He recalled one man saying: “You better not be f***ing joking.” He wasn’t.
The judge-alone trial is set down for three weeks, during which the court will hear evidence from some more of the survivors.
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