Abbey Caves inquest: Water may have reached neck height in 30 seconds

A teacher on a fatal school caving trip says he didn't consider waiting out a flood in a higher passage because at that time he believed the safest option was to get out of the cave.

The teacher, who was cross-examined on Tuesday in an inquest into the 2023 Abbey Caves tragedy in Whangārei, said when he decided to cut the trip short the main risk was that the students could roll their ankles in the knee-deep water.

At the time - based on his many visits to Organ Cave, including after heavy rain - he didn't believe flash flooding was a risk.

He knew the two other caves in the area, Middle Cave and Ivy Cave, did flood.

The teacher said there was light drizzle as the Year 11 group entered the cave, but the colour and level of the water at the entrance was normal for the time of year.

He noticed the water rising - he put it at "2 to 3 inches" - and decided the safest thing to do was to exit the cave, regroup outside, have some food, and go back in to continue exploring an area known as The Squeeze if conditions allowed.

If they had decided to wait in the upper passage, the group had limited light, no food, and no idea of how long they would have to wait.

The teacher was also aware heavy rain was forecast that afternoon.

He said it was only when the group passed an area called The Rockfall and got close to the exit that the water started rising with alarming speed.

He described the water as going from knee deep to neck deep in a period of, at most, two minutes - but possibly as little as 30 seconds.

The teacher told the court he still could not understand why the water rose so quickly, and said he had not seen anything like it in all his years of caving.

He had thought about it often and wondered whether part of the cave had been blocked by debris, or if a blockage upstream had suddenly burst.

"It almost came in like a wave, which is not what caves do … That's still a mystery to me."

Ellie Harrison, lawyer for the family of Karnin Petera, the 15-year-old who died, quizzed the teacher about why he did not consider staying in the upper passage.

The teacher said he had hopped into the water to check the level in the main passage and found it was only knee-deep.

Had the flash flood hit minutes earlier, they would have stayed in the upper passage, he said.

Harrison also asked about the group's lack of emergency communication.

She said Karnin's father, Andre Petera, had called the school twice to raise concerns about flooding in Whangārei city, but the receptionist had "brushed him off".

Even if the receptionist had tried to pass on those concerns, there was no way of contacting the group because there was no cellphone coverage beyond the Abbey Caves car park.

The lack of another form of communication had also caused a delay in raising the alarm, with some of the boys having to run to a nearby house to call 111, she said.

However, the teacher said having a satellite phone would have made little difference, because it was only a short distance uphill to reach cellphone coverage.

In any case, he would not have had a chance to make a satellite call because he was still inside the cave rescuing students when the alarm was raised.

The second adult on the trip would to start giving his evidence this afternoon.

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