Saltwater and Stillness: Mount Maunganui Remembers Its Lost

Morning light settles gently over Mount Maunganui, tracing the curve of the shoreline and the familiar rise of Mauao. The mountain stands as it always has—watchful, steady—while the sea shifts restlessly at its base. On this day, the water carries a different weight, as if aware of the reason people are gathering along the sand.

Surfers arrive quietly, boards tucked under their arms, wetsuits damp with anticipation rather than urgency. They move toward the water in small groups, stepping past the ordinary rhythms of a beach morning. This is a paddle-out, a gesture born of surf culture and widened by grief, held to honor those who lost their lives in the recent landslide on Mauao.

The landslide, which sent earth and rock sliding down the mountain’s slope, took lives and unsettled a place woven deeply into the identity of the community. Authorities moved swiftly in the aftermath, closing areas around the mountain and beginning assessments to understand what failed and how to prevent it from happening again. Investigations continue, measured and technical, while the emotional accounting unfolds elsewhere.

Out on the water, the surfers form a loose circle, boards touching, bodies rising and falling with the swell. Some bow their heads. Others stare toward the mountain, its green face marked by absence. Words are sparse, if they come at all. The sea does much of the speaking, lifting the group together, then setting them down again.

Paddle-outs have long served as a way to mark loss along coastlines, blending movement with stillness. Here, beneath Mauao, the ritual expands to hold a wider sorrow—one that reaches beyond the surf community to families, neighbors, and all who understand the mountain as more than a landmark. It is a place of stories, of whakapapa, of daily paths walked without thought until suddenly they are no longer open.

As the circle breaks, individuals linger. Some paddle back in silence. Others remain, drifting, reluctant to let the moment end. Onshore, people watch from the sand, hands in pockets, eyes fixed on the water. There is no resolution offered here, only acknowledgment.

The facts remain clear and unchanged. Lives were lost in the landslide. Safety reviews and investigations are ongoing. Access to parts of Mauao remains restricted. But for this stretch of morning, the community chooses a different language—saltwater and presence, motion and pause—to say what cannot be fixed.

When the boards finally return to shore, the beach resumes its quiet routines. Waves continue their steady work. Mauao keeps its watch. And the circle on the water, though gone, leaves behind a trace—an understanding that remembrance, like the tide, returns again and again.

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Sources (names only) RNZ Stuff NZ Herald Associated Press