- written by Dante Numa for Te Awaroa Museum.
The Kaipara Harbour entrance holds a record number of shipwrecks becoming what is well known as ‘The Graveyard’. The bar is only 6-7km wide, with white wash, shifting sand bars and large swells brought by gales. Over 100 ships have wrecked in the Kaipara Harbour, and it still very much feared today, despite new technology. In the sailing era, captains had to navigate through these dangers, relying on local knowledge, maps, and tools such as lead lines. These lines had leather markers attached measuring the depth of the water and the lead weight at the bottom was covered in wax catching sediment to understand what lay on the ocean floor. Later steam boats would help tow sail boats through. Although large gales wrecked ships, the lack of wind could also fail them like the ship ‘Aurora’, which could no longer sail and was then driven by waves onto a bank in 1840. In some cases, the captains judgement was questioned. The ship named ‘Lady Franklin’ was anchored in the harbour but the cable had parted while there was no anchor watch and the ship was driven ashore, she was refloated but became stranded again in 1876. In 1902 the ‘May’ became wrecked. Its tug boat named the ‘Pilot’ captained by Johnny Harrison could no longer control the barquentine in a westerly gale. They agreed to part ways saving the lives of those on the ‘Pilot’ but leaving the ‘May’ to break into pieces. When the ship went down a sole survivor named Wati Dunn had managed to swim ashore. He was the Northern Wairoa swimming champion. Shifting sands and tides are still uncovering wrecks, most recently in Pouto Point in July this year, and the importance of preserving them allows the world to discover their stories and honour the lives that were lost.
“The breakers were dashing on several sand bars in an awful manner, about three miles from the land. The late westerly gale caused the fearful commotion of the rolling waves to bound on these sea sand-spits, dashing the surf to an unusual height. No vessel, of any size or shape, could at this time have entered the Kaipara; instant shipwreck, into a thousand pieces, would have been the result.” -Samuel Polack’s warning of the Kaipara Harbour 1831.
