Waikato, New Zealand News

A new investigational device - the Helio System - being developed for use with the Sapien XT Transcatheter Heart Valve was successfully deployed in all four patients in a small, first-in-human feasibility study of its use in high-risk aortic insufficiency reported at EuroPCR 2013.

The weather was grey but the maritime landscape off Hardinge Rd in Ahuriri yesterday was even greyer as one of the Royal New Zealand Navy's inshore patrol vessels paid a visit.

Today's break from the run of unsettled weather that has affected most of the country is expected to be short-lived, particularly for the north of the North Island.

From towing his two-tonne boat to lugging around 190-kilogram arc welders, Lou McCauley's dark green 1971 Ford Falcon XY ute has never missed a beat.

Recent belts of rain have resulted in some minor slips across the SH5 stretch between Napier and Taupo.

Mining exploration is rolling ahead in the Waikato with a big chunk of the South Waikato, Bay of Plenty and central plateau up for tender for gold miners.

An abandoned car found in a forest near Taupo this month is not connected with the disappearance of hitchhiker Mona Blades almost 38 years ago, police say.

Generation Homes' first joint venture partner Lyndon Marshall has now taken over the company's flagship Tauranga operation.

COLD VIGIL: Constables Pat Moulden and Barry White were in the search parties send to look for Wilder in the early 1960s.

Searchers looking for a man missing in the bush since Monday are concerned by the discovery of his cold weather gear, sleeping bag and food.

"The victim was taken to Waikato Hospital with a variety of head injuries and bruising to his body and has since been discharged today," said Detective Sergeant Dean Anderson.

Heard the one about the gazelle and the lion? Employers and Manufacturers Association chief executive Kim Campbell likes to tell it because it neatly cuts to how he thinks New Zealand Inc should be behaving, but isn't. "In Africa, a gazelle wakes up and looks across to the thicket where the lion is.

Coromandel locals don't need to go very far for a drink, with the district having more alcohol outlets per person than anywhere else in the region.

The number of searchers looking for missing West Coast man Les Wright will be boosted overnight to 50 as the search centres on a 20-square kilometre area of native bush west of Benneydale in Waikato.

Canterbury's position as the irrigating capital of New Zealand has strengthened over the last five years with an extra 60,000 hectares of farmland under the tap.

An elderly man was killed when his vehicle was T-boned by a fully laden logging truck as he attempted a u-turn on State Highway One, north of Tokoroa, this morning.

Hawke's Bay and former Hurricanes rugby star Chris Eaton remains in shock and continues to grieve his wife, following her death in an Easter weekend car crash, but has vowed in an interview with Woman's Day to honour her memory by raising their young daughter the way she would have wanted.

Plans for a new liquor store in Te Aroha have been met with a protest by residents who say there are enough outlets to buy booze in the little town.

Police investigating the historic disappearance of Mona Blades say they'll be following reports of an abandoned vehicle spotted by a hunter in the Rangitaiki Forest near Taupo.

Waikato Police say the area where a West Coast man missing for three days could have possibly gone to are so vast it is presenting huge challenges for the staff tasked with finding him.