audio problem with miniDV tape

shot an event recently, and was using the on-camera mic. there is about a 10 minute portion of the tape where the audio is just completely gone. i happened to notice a few drop outs on the tape around the time of the audio problem, so i assumed it's not a mic related problem. the audio was fine on the next few tapes i used.

this is not a make-or-break segment for me (thankfully!) but i would obviously like to find out of the audio exists somewhere on the tape. i remember in the old analog days i had a similar issue, and by adjusting the tape head alignment, i was able to restore the audio. wouldn't dream of trying that with the miniDV stuff unless it's more do-able than i think.

suggestions? or am i SOL? :)

JS