McTaggart (20) felt it personally because fellow club member Peter O'Neill (55) died in the disaster.
McTaggart and O'Neill won the West Coast champion of champions pairs title last season.
McTaggart, a printer at the Greymouth Star, has been playing bowls for the past five years and has built up an impressive record.
His best performance was to finish runner-up in the New Zealand under-25 pairs with Shannon McIlroy.
He is among the most prominent younger bowlers in the country and is in a promising team of young guns that cruised through to post-section play in the fours yesterday.
The team is skipped by 18-year-old Ryan Khan (Johnsonville), who is a grandson of Millie Khan and was in the New Zealand under-18 team that won the Trans Tasman event against Australia for the first time last year.
The third in the team is Christchurch building apprentice Nathan Glasson (21), who finished runner-up in the New Zealand secondary schools' singles in 2007.
He has impressed during the championships by reaching the quarterfinals of the singles.
In the No2 spot is Evan Scott (20), who comes from the strong Onehunga club in Auckland.
He won the New Zealand under-20 singles last year.
The team had their fourth win on the trot yesterday when they beat Bill Johnson (Waimate) 20-8 to qualify for post-section play.
Their only loss came in the fifth game, where they were beaten by former international Sean O'Neill (West End, Timaru) 22-15.
That team included lead Barrie Andrews, who was in ONeill's team when they won the fours title in Dunedin in 2007.
Another team to qualify with former champions was Ken Walker's Composite team, which includes Bruce McNish, who skipped the team when it won the title in 1983.
The team reached top form yesterday when it gained the two extra wins needed to qualify, beating Glen Milne (Waihopai) 26-6 and Robert Wilson (Clutha Valley) 22-15.
Another team to get the two wins it needed yesterday was the Kelly gang, which was skipped by Shannon McIlroy with Andrew Kelly dropping to second.
The team includes the promising lead Nick Buttar and pairs champion Chris Le Lievre.
It clinched a place in post-section by beating Rex Calder (Outram) 25-4 and Steve Morris (Caversham) 22-9.
Other top men's teams to qualify were Alvin Gardiner (Elmwood), Kerry Becks (Kaipoi), Ali Forsyth (Taren Point), Gary Lawson (Eastbourne), Mark Watt (North East Valley), Peter Sain (Carlton Cornwall), Terry Scott (North East Valley), Lou Newman (Victoria) and Vern Scarf (Kaikorai).
The Kaikorai team includes former internationals Stewart and Duncan McConnell, who dominated Dunedin bowls in the 1970s and early 1980s.
Stewart won a bronze medal in the fours at the 1990 Commonwealth Games.
The best women's game yesterday was in the fourth round when defending champion Barbara McGregor (United, Nelson) beat this year's pairs runner-up, Wynette McLachlan (Clinton), 17-9.
The United team includes national champions Dianne Potts and Dale Bourke.
The newcomer is Misty Arnold.
The game was even when McLachlan led 7-6 after nine ends.
But two brilliant rescue shots by the United team added six more points on the next two ends.
McLachlan had shots on the heads on the 10th end when Arnold took the shot bowls out for three shots.
McGregor repeated the dose on the next end, when she drove the jack into the ditch, and United led 11-7.
The experienced McGregor played defensive bowls after this to edge further ahead with five more singles.
United gained its fourth win by beating Winnie McLelland (Andersons Bay) 17-6 in the next round.
McLachlan needed two more wins to qualify and did this by beating Ngaire Marshall (Fairfield) 29-2 and Ruth Grant (Alexandra) 18-15.
Other noted women's teams to qualify were Pam Phair (Elmwood), Sandra Keith (Allenton), Carolyn Crawford (St Clair), Black Jack Dale Lang (Tawa), Dawn Richards (Halswell), Stella Trower (Elmwood) and Anne Gawn (Outram).
