Eight people are feared dead after a fishing boat sank off New Zealand’s coast.

SHIPS are on alert and maritime authorities are monitoring the movements of hundreds of menacing icebergs drifting toward New Zealand in the southern Pacific Ocean, officials said.

Hundreds of Antarctic icebergs were drifting north toward New Zealand today, prompting a warning to all ships in the area.

RESCUERS pushing and dragging whales managed to refloat 39 members of a beached pod during high tide yesterday as dozens of other whales lay dead on a remote island off southern New Zealand, officials said.

Rescuers refloated 39 pilot whales at high tide, but dozens more died today after a pod beached on a remote island off southern New Zealand.