This German anti-shipping mine washed ashore at Mōkau Heads on 2 December 1942. It was thought to be one of a number laid off the south Australian coast by the German Navy during the Second World War.
The mine was found by Alf Povey at low tide on a sandbank under a cliff on the northern side of the Mōkau River and refloated at high tide the following day then defused by New Plymouth's 2C Section Bomb Disposal Group, part of the NZ Engineering Corps.
The shell of the mine is now mounted on a concrete base in Mōkau township on State Highway 3. Interestingly, it has been mounted upside down.
It is a Type-EM naval moored contact mine similar to one displayed on the Coastal Walkway in New Plymouth. They were probably both laid by the German naval ships Penguin and Passat near Melbourne or in Bass Strait in October or November 1940. Many such mines were swept but some broke their moorings and drifted west to New Zealand.
Three mines are known to have washed ashore on Taranaki beaches during World War Two – at Bell Block on 28 November 1942, this one in Mōkau and below Belt Road on 15 February 1943. The Bomb Disposal Group disarmed all of them before being disbanded in November 1943.
Inscription on plaque on concrete base:
LET THIS GERMAN MINE FOUND
DECEMBER 2ND 1942 REMIND US
IN THE DAYS OF PEACE. WITHOUT
VISION THE PEOPLE PERISH
Plaque donated by
MOKAU PROGRESSIVE ASSOCIATION
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