WITH much of its red paint weathering away and rust visible at the base, the old German mine at the centre of Mōkau looks a bit the worse wear these days.
But if the spherical floating bomb ever falls apart, to be replaced by a fibreglass copy, it will have already done a fine job of promoting Mōkau.
Standing on a plinth on SH3, the munition has been mentioned in numerous newspaper articles and on historical websites and many motorists point and comment as they slow down for the little Waitomo town.
It washed ashore at Mōkau Heads on, December 2, 1942, was defused by the Navy and years later got placed at the centre of town by the Mōkau Progressive Society.
An inscription at the base of the structure partially quotes the Bible’s Book of Proverbs (Chapter 29, verse 18): “In the days of peace, without vision the people perish”.
But there would have been no memorialisation and no landmark had the mine fulfilled what it was designed for, which was to create a mighty explosion that nobody would want to remember.
We get a clue on what might have been from the Tainui Historical Society’s Jennifer Topless, who has turned up an account of another marine mine, which really did explode at Mōkau in January 1919.
The story, which was in the Taranaki Daily News, described how a huge explosion terrified Mōkau residents when a mine, this time from World War 1, washed up and blew up on the rocky reef a little north of Awakino.
“The main force of the concussion appeared to have struck the homestead of Pioi Station. The household had retired for the night when the explosion took place, severely shaking the house and breaking a good deal of the glass, besides unfastening doors and windows. The force of the explosion was sufficient to tear lead heads of some nails in the roofing iron of the house.”
The story went on to describe how locals picked up jagged metal shards of the mine itself. These were similar in appearance to those gathered following the detonation of another German mine at Rahotu some weeks previously.
The article concluded that consequences would have been much worse had the tide taken the device closer to the homestead.
“Two sons and a daughter of the local storekeeper passed along the coast a few minutes before the explosion. They stated they crossed the river when they saw a flash of flame immediately followed by a crash of explosion.”
