Inquiries & Recommendations

Ngā ketuketutanga me ngā tūtohunga

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The Commission found that the fire was seated amongst bales of polypropylene bags that were stored in the fishmeal bagging room, but was unable to establish with any certainty what started the fire. The Commission also found that the Amaltal Columbia's design and systems for the prevention, detection, containment and fighting of a fire met the standards of the applicable maritime rules; however, there were some aspects that could have been improved, and the consequences of the fire could have been lessened, with a more risk-based approach to operations.

On Friday 31 August 2012 a scheduled Auckland metropolitan passenger train was travelling south from Britomart Station to Manukau Station. The train had stopped at Puhinui Station to exchange passengers. While it was sitting at the station, train control set the wrong route for the train through Wiri Junction. The route was set to take the train straight through to Papakura instead of diverging to the Manukau Branch Line. The signal ahead of the train was showing the driver that his train was routed for Papakura instead of Manukau. However, the driver did not recognise this.

On 24 August 2012, the passenger fishing charter vessel Torea was taking a group of passengers on a fishing charter in the Foveaux Strait area. There were 24 passengers and 3 crew members on board. The Torea was only permitted to carry 20 passengers. The skipper was unaware that he had more than 20 passengers on board. While fishing for cod close to Seal Rocks in the area off Ruapuke Island, the Torea struck an uncharted rock as the skipper was increasing speed to move to another area.

On Wednesday 1 August 2012, a southbound freight train was travelling from Picton to Christchurch. At the same time a northbound freight train was travelling from Christchurch to Picton. The train controller had planned to cross the trains at the Pines track warrant station.

Please contact ATSB using the link in the sidebar on the right for full report

On 20 June 2012 an Air New Zealand Airbus A320 was landing at Wellington International Airport when it suffered a bird strike to its right engine. The bird strike did not affect the landing. The bird was later identified as a black-backed gull. Maintenance engineers inspected the engine in accordance with the Airbus aircraft maintenance manual and released it back into revenue service later the same day for a flight to Auckland with 172 persons on board, including five crew members.

A KiwiRail Holdings Limited freight train (Train 229) consisting of two locomotives hauling 33 wagons was travelling from Auckland to Wellington overnight on 2 and 3 May 2012. At 0034 on 3 May one of four sets of wheels on the fifth wagon derailed. The wagon was dragged for nearly three kilometres in that state to a rail junction at Maewa, about 22 kilometres north of Palmerston North, where it and five other wagons completely derailed.

At about 1600 on 26 April 2012, the four train control workstations in the Auckland control room located in the Wellington National Train Control Centre (train control) suddenly lost power and shut down. As a consequence, all of the signals in the Auckland metropolitan area automatically reverted to red ("Stop") and all rail movements in Auckland progressively stopped.

On 6 April 2012 the 9.5-tonne body of a damaged freight wagon (the load) was being carried on a purpose-built "special-movement wagon" (the wagon). The wagon was one of 60 on a northbound freight train travelling from Dunedin to Christchurch.

At about 2000 on 14 March 2012, the fishing vessel Easy Rider departed Bluff for Big South Cape Island off the west coast of Stewart Island. The skipper, 2 crew members and 6 passengers were on board. The passengers were to be offloaded at Big South Cape Island, where they were to prepare for the upcoming muttonbird harvest. The skipper intended then to travel to his fishing grounds to engage in commercial fishing.

At 0639 on Saturday 7 January 2012, a Cameron Balloons Limited A210 hot-air balloon lifted off from near Carterton in the Wairarapa area for a commercial flight. There were one pilot and 10 passengers on board. The weather conditions were fine with a light and variable wind, which was suitable for the flight. The balloon had been airborne for about 35 minutes when the pilot began to descend the balloon in preparation for landing in the Somerset Road area.