‘Good luck’ that trampers rescued from Mt Aspiring

A tramper with a broken leg and no way to call for help was saved because of the distress beacon of an unknown woman nearby.

The two trampers were pulled from tracks at Mount Aspiring National Park after 9pm on Thursday after separate incidents led to them both needing to be rescued.

The man faced the possibility of having to crawl with a suspected broken leg back to a track in the hope of finding passers-by, a Maritime New Zealand statement read.

He had suitable clothing and food, but did not have a rescue beacon to raise the alarm after he fell.

The woman did not have the right gear for her trip after the weather turned and, after finding herself in trouble at Liverpool Hut and ‘‘increasingly afraid’’, she set her beacon off about 7.15pm.

The helicopter was unable to

"You do not have to be injured to be in trouble and needing help. It is better to act sooner and call for help than it is to leave it too late."

Search-and-rescue mission co-ordinator Geoff Lunt

pinpoint her location when the rescue crew arrived in the area as she had turned the beacon off.

‘‘Luckily for the injured man stuck near Mt Barff, the helicopter team located his torch light instead and landed to investigate . . . [he] had shined it into the sky when he heard the helicopter,’’ the statement said.

Rescue Coordination Centre New Zealand search-and-rescue mission co-ordinator Geoff Lunt said the woman turned her beacon off because, as she was uninjured, she became worried she should not have activated it.

‘‘By pure good luck, the one distress beacon between two people in different places saw both rescued,’’ he said.

‘‘You do not have to be injured to be in trouble and needing help. It is better to act sooner and call for help than it is to leave it too late, risking injury or even death, and possibly worse weather for the rescuers.’’

Lunt urged ‘‘every group’’ going into the bush to take a registered beacon with them, ‘‘and make sure their emergency contacts know about their intended route’’.

The injured man was taken to Lakes District Hospital in Queenstown and police search and rescue personnel helped the woman find somewhere to stay.