Original article just updated:
"Colville said the rescuers had warmed them and their body temperatures were rising and no longer in danger of being hypothermic.
"They are doing well, in tents and have had a hot meal."
Good news. SAR at it's finest!
Collected at 1pm during a break in the weather.
DOCs response
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/71779200/Stuck-trampers-rescued-after-night-in-below-freezing-temperatures-near-Nelson-Lakes
Some of you may remember me talking of our experience, last year, coming from Angelus, mid-afternoon, snow and ice, but perfect, still sunny weather. We had just stopped to take our crampons off near Mt Robert when a couple met up with us going the other way - no crampons etc. We urged them to turn around. The woman thought I was describing Climbing Mt Angelus, not just the route to the hut! They had no idea what they were getting into. They carried on. As there were no reports we assume they turned back, or by some miracle got through.
I think we can blame Lonely Planet. Mt Angelus is very highly rated in there, I believe. I did look it up back then and, to give them their due, I think they did warn of alpine conditions but people do not see that, or ignore it.
Even on the Speargrass 'escape route' (it's the easiest, or often the only one to use) you have to climb steeply from the hut to the 'saddle' mentioned at 1730m, or so, which is very exposed.
They were lucky - they had cell phone coverage, it would seem. The next lot might not be. I have so frequently met people, up in that area, who haven't a clue, or the gear. One couple had a day pack and 3 supermarket plastic bags and wearing trainers!
AAAGGGGHHHHHHH!
not sure anything makes a difference, massive warning signs about the potential alpine conditions on the tongariro crossing make little difference as people follow each other like sheep in their jeans and cotton shirts.
Time to recognise a cold truth here. The tourism industry in this country is worth billions. But it parasites off our back-country generally and our SAR volunteers in particular.
It's time this very large and important economic sector took more responsibility for it's externalities. I'm aware that there are many small tourism operators who do their best within the context they operate in. But overall this industry which saw over 3 million visitors last year seems to be asked to do relatively little to put back into the core asset which attracts people here.
Tourism should be funding DoC to the tune of hundreds of millions a year. It should be funding conservation and visitor programs designed to give our guests the best possible experiences - promoting awareness, safety and protection of the places they visit and want to experience. It should be funding SAR and better ways to prevent people making these same mistakes over and over.
We've all had the same experiences - blithe, sometimes arrogantly, unaware visitors ignoring advice and putting themselves into risk zones with no margin for safety.
These two only just got away with this. They made a simple mistake to leave the safety of the hut, with not enough daylight, unaware of how quickly conditions might change - and that even the 'safe route' might prove too much for them. There are a myriad variations on these same simple errors experienced locals usually don't make.
When we learn to tramp we usually have a mentoring community of some sort, scouts, tramping or alpine clubs, or these days decent on-line resources. While this doesn't prevent us from getting it wrong, the collective wisdom of the local tramping culture does inform and protect us to some degree.
Not so much the millions of visitors we are profiting off every year. They arrive here for just weeks or maybe a few months - and regardless of their skills or experience - many head into our alpine regions for an adventure. That most get away with mostly by sheer luck alone - like these two young people - is not acceptable.
NZ profits from our visitors and we need to start holding ourselves a lot more accountable for what this means.
This post has been edited by the author on 7 September 2015 at 11:34.
We could start by letting DOC tap into the Vote:Tourism funding for activities which are most directly related to coping with tourism, rather than local recreation or conservation. When the government spends lots on attracting people to the country through its tourism budget, DOC needs to have a direct claim into that new funding for managing the impact of the influx without risking existing programmes.
Presently all of the spending seems to be taken from Vote:Conservation and then lumped under "recreation" ($144m spent to year-ending June 2014). But as it's all simply classified as "recreation", it's less clear how that money gets split (or will be split in future) between "recreation" for short term international tourists compared with recreation that's part of DOC's mandate to provide outdoor opportunities for people generally.
To be fair, the Conservation Act's mandate only says that DOC's meant to be fostering recreation. It doesn't say that it's meant to be fostering recreation of New Zealand residents. Given the Act also says "allow for tourism", I think that's a reasonable interpretation of the intent, but to me the wording in the law is an oversight.
For the record, according to the 2014 annual report there was $22.5m revenue from recreation opportunity concessions during the same 12 month period, although keep in mind that (rightly or wrongly) recreation businesses would also argue that they pay business tax which should partially be allocated to the services they're getting. The other $123m was allocated from Crown funding.
This post has been edited by the author on 7 September 2015 at 11:15.
@izogi
I always appreciate your informed and thoughtful comments.
My instinct here is that just moaning about 'stupid visitors making stupid mistakes' is not going to take us anywhere. Except maybe give us a few moments of an entirely undeserved sense of smugness.
It's time to lift our game. DoC needs a dramatically increased funding to discharge it's true mandate. The local recreation communities are concerned to preserve and protect their heritage and the special character of the NZ backcountry. And our many overseas visitors deserve better.
Somewhere in this nexus lies opportunity.
This post has been edited by the author on 7 September 2015 at 11:20.
its interesting looking at the posts on this forum from visitors to nz, a lot of them already have an itinerary and mention specific places they want to go before they've been in NZ and fully appreciate what it can be like. problem with that is what you find when you get there may not be what you expected, ie the weather could be a lot worse and or terrain rough leading to an issue like this one. certain places feature regularly in publicity over and over and those tend to be the places where people mention they want to go , despite the fact that there are countless miles of tracks in nz to choose from.. i dont think most visitors will realise the extent of our back country infrastructure. most of it doesnt get much mention in the media.
About noon sunday drove up to the East Egmont Plateau, and at a mere 1100m, and nearly got hypothermia struggling the 100m from the car to the toilet block and back. High winds, driving sleet and snow. Very nasty wind chill. Thought to myself, gee, hope anyone thats out in this is really really really well wrapped up.
