Wellington, Dec 27 (DPA) Twenty-one whales died and 42 were successfully refloated after a mass stranding on a New Zealand beach Sunday, a Department of Conservation spokesman said, according to news reports.

Hundreds of holiday-makers helped keep survivors wet at Colville Bay, on the Coromandel Peninsula, until they could be refloated on the afternoon's high tide.

Spokesman Steve Bolton said department workers would keep watch during the night in case the pod, which had moved out to sea, tried to return to the beach.