Two men are dead after going to extreme measures to manufacture drugs - their bodies were found in a P-lab in an abandoned mine shaft deep in the Coromandel bush.
The pair, in their 40s, were surrounded by chemicals and drug-making paraphernalia in an underground mine about 30m off a winding, gravel road running through rugged land between Whitianga and Coromandel township.
The shaft was hidden from the road, up a slope covered by thick bush.
Forensic investigators wearing protective clothing emerged from the bush on to the 309 Rd last night, carrying equipment including an LPG bottle, a funnel, a fan and a large container of caustic soda.
Police would not confirm the drugs link last night, but two people living nearby said it was believed the men were making methamphetamine.
One person who lives near the place where the men were found said the road had a history of drug-related crime.
Other neighbours said they had been told the men were killed by the explosion of a P lab, but police said there had been no blast.
At least one of the deceased men was known to some locals.
More than half the clandestine meth labs police discover are in houses, garages or sheds in residential areas, but others have been found in less obvious places.
In the past three years, police have found labs in caravans, vehicles, shipping containers, motels and baches.
Police attending a fire at a gang house in Wanganui stopped a car speeding from the scene and found a mobile P laboratory in the boot.
Detective Sergeant Ross Patterson, of the Waikato investigation branch, said it was too early to comment on what substances were removed, as they still had to be analysed.
The dead men's families were being notified last night, and a post-mortem examination is to be done in Auckland today to establish the cause of death.
Emergency services were alerted to the deaths at 5pm on Saturday. Police have not revealed who told them about the bodies.
Officers spent 24 hours at the scene and specialists were required to carry out the difficult job of bringing the bodies of the men from the mine and down through the bush.
The bodies were removed at 3pm yesterday and several hours later, eight police officers and forensic experts wearing protective gear appeared from the shaft.
Firefighters were on alert for chemicals or flammable liquids when they were called to the scene about 9.30pm on Saturday.
Several people have been injured or killed when P labs went wrong.
The first fatality was reported in 2007 when a 33-year-old man died from burns after a P lab explosion at Te Hana, north of Wellsford.
Meth can be produced in 6 to 8 hours using apparatus and cookware that can be dismantled rapidly.
Up to $10 million is spent annually on insurance claims relating to cleaning and sometimes replacing houses used to manufacture P.
