Couple missing in Kahurangi National Park

Certainly from listening to the audio the terrain features mentioned are inconsistent with anything on the map in their destination of travel. Having said that, I have few problems with anything they did other than the apparent lack of PLB, compass and/or GPS. (And lack of clear intentions). From what I can tell they walked up the Anatori as intended. When it got rugged/gorged they climbed out then got turned around in the fog. This can happen to anyone. They then made a sensible decision to camp until they could try and re-orientate. Once the sun came out they tried to move, got in trouble and again set up camp. Given the navigational aids they had that was a reasonable decision too. (If any once cares) I have my own definition of "lost". I would say when they got turned around in the fog and chose to set up that camp, they were not "lost" but "temporarily uncertain of their location". This state can last anywhere from minutes to days as if with their situation you do not get a chance to establish your location. Now, once the weather cleared and they still did not know where they were, tried to move and got in trouble — that is obviously "lost" to me. So sitting tight rather than blundering around was a good decision to me. By my definition I have never been lost so not sure how I would react. As with most of us, I have been "temporarily uncertain" on many occasions including once overnight in a similar situation to their fog experience.

I'm just struggling to visualise how one unknowingly goes round in circles in a steep river valley. If you're heading away from the river you're climbing, heading towards it you're descending. I realise sub-ridges and feeder streams can make that less clear cut, but in the main I would've thought it would be easy enough to know which general direction you were heading in by the gradient. I can understand getting turned around on the ridge top though.

I'm with Dodgy Dave on this, clearly the map had insufficient detail in what is very knarly terrain to make an accurate assessment of where they were. I listened to the audio as well, and while they've clearly made some mistakes, but I can fully identify with a couple of young trampers who have learned some tough lessons the hard way. Confusing, rough terrain and constant low level cloud would geographically embarrass more than a few of us, I can see a much younger and less experienced version of myself walking into exactly the same trap. Congrats to LandSAR; they must be totally stoked to have pulled this one out of the bag!

Just on compasses, I don't think it's necessarily enough to simply say they should've taken one for where they were going, assuming they hadn't. I guess it never hurts to have one, but IMHO they're so much more useful when you've used them a lot already. In this case I don't know if they had or not. Nav is a skill more than any specific thing and I'm not normally a fan of suggesting people should do anything other than learn as much about navigating and building up skill as possible, but that's also not realistic for the world we live in. If you've rarely or never used a compass before then maybe you're better off making sure you have whatever's going to work best under the circumstances whether it's a GPS or a smartphone or whatever else. You can say the same for a PLB when it comes to rescue. By far the best thing, and what we should all aim for, is to be prepared and skilled and to avoid needing to rely on others, and to leave reliable intentions so that you can have a good chance of being found even if you're incapable of asking for help, but it's statistical inevitable that sometimes that simply won't happen. It's also inevitable that sometimes mistakes happen even when people make an honest effort. After everything else went wrong for whatever reason, if they'd had a PLB in this instance they'd probably have been out of this with just a short helicopter response a couple of weeks ago, and it'd have barely made the news.

PLB definitely "fixes" most of their problems and reduces the search from a weeks long exercise involving 50+ people to a much more "simple" helicopter ride out. That is oversimplifying it to a degree, but, I think the overall sentiment makes sense. Now, not saying all you need is a PLB — they obviously need some decent gear to survive the poor/foggy weather for a few days as they initially did. But when they decided they needed to GTFO a PLB would have been a huge asset. Definitely a good advertisement for PLBs in general.

The minimum function a compass guarantees - even if you're not skilled in navigating with one with a map - is that you never lose your sense of direction, or get "turned around". I know this from bitter experience. I got "lost" for a couple of days once in Te Urewera, thanks to losing my sense of direction. A quick glance at a compass would've told me how out of whack I'd gotten and very quickly sorted the problem.

I think we overcomplicate compasses. Like most things H&S related if we just focussed on the basics (instead of overwhelming people with complicated details & scaring them with how only an expert can master it) we'd resolve 95%+ of the issues. Purists will shoot me for it, but here's Madpom's 30 second compass tutorial for young wannabe possumers: 1. Look at map & determine angle from north you want to go (indicate angle against map with flat hand) 2. Turn compass dial till it's at that same angle 3. Hold compass flat away from body & point red end of needle at 20 degrees right of the N 4. Find an object in direction compass arrow points. 5. Walk to it. Repeat steps 4&5 ad nauseum with reference to map whenever a landmark or change in terrain is encountered to check you're on the right track. There. Complies with H&S best practice of 'no more than 5 points'. I generally wave their metal stapler at the compass as they hold it & show how that swings the needle. And explain the 20 degrees offset with 'the magnetic north pole isn't at the top of the world'. Ok. It's not perfect & won't win you any orienteering prizes. But it will keep you going close enough the right direction to put out a bait line or hit a road. And most importantly, most people 'get' how to do it.

RNZ have published an article to remind people to use PLBs https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/417763/trampers-urged-to-always-carry-locator-beacons

interview with chopper pilots and medic who found them https://www.tvnz.co.nz/one-news/new-zealand/trampers-found-alive-after-18-days-in-bush-near-nelson-overjoyed-upon-seeing-rescuers?auto=6159938020001

seen a few comments on various tramping groups online their problems may have been something to do with what they may have been smoking