{"id":381983,"date":"2026-04-16T05:38:11","date_gmt":"2026-04-16T05:38:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/381983\/"},"modified":"2026-04-16T05:38:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-16T05:38:11","slug":"two-dead-after-five-trapped-under-riverbank-in-bay-of-plenty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/381983\/","title":{"rendered":"Two dead after five trapped under riverbank in Bay of Plenty"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two people have died after a water-related incident near the Waikato township of Kawerau today.<\/p>\n

1News understands the victims were children. <\/p>\n

Police acting eastern Bay of Plenty Area Commander Phil Gillbanks said the incident occurred in the Tarawera River near Boyce Park.<\/p>\n

Gillbanks said emergency services were called to the scene at about 11.30am after a report of a party becoming stuck under a bank.<\/p>\n

“Sadly, two people were located deceased a short time later.”<\/p>\n

\"Manukorihi<\/p>\n

Manukorihi Drive is on the north-eastern edge of Kawerau, in an industrial precinct separated from the township by the Tarawera River. (Source: Google Satellite)<\/p>\n

Hato Hone St John confirmed officers also assessed three people in a minor condition at the scene.<\/p>\n

An ambulance, a First Response Unit, two operations managers, a rapid response unit were scrambled to the scene near Manukorihi Drive. A helicopter was also sent.<\/p>\n

Manukorihi Drive is on the north-eastern edge of Kawerau, in an industrial precinct separated from the township by the Tarawera River.<\/p>\n

In a post to Facebook, Kawerau District Council said: “An incident occurred today in our community”.<\/p>\n

“We understand the New Zealand Police, Fire Emergency New Zealand and St John are at the scene.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“We ask that Kawerau allow these emergency services to do their mahi.”<\/p>\n

The council added the community will be updated “in due course”.<\/p>\n

A nearby business told 1News people had gathered at Boyce Park.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two people have died after a water-related incident near the Waikato township of Kawerau today. 1News understands the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":381984,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,1756,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-381983","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-tauranga-bay-of-plenty","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/381983","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=381983"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/381983\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/381984"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=381983"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=381983"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=381983"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}