WELLINGTON — New Zealand's Defence Minister on Oct 10 publicly criticised online trolling of the female captain of a naval vessel that sunk at the weekend, saying while the cause of the incident was unknown, it had nothing to do with the captain's gender.

The Manawanui, the navy's specialist dive and hydrographic vessel, sank on Oct 6 on a reef off the coast of Samoa that it was surveying.

Its 75 crew and passengers were ordered to abandon the vessel in life rafts and were later rescued.

"A court of inquiry has been stood up to establish what caused this terrible incident. The one thing that we already know did not cause it is the gender of the ship's captain," said Ms Judith Collins, who is New Zealand's first female defence minister.

She said she was appalled to see the comments online from "armchair admirals, people who will never have to make decisions which mean life or death for their subordinates".

She added women in uniform were being abused in the street following the incident.

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