Skiers rescued from snow cave
Two overseas ski tourers were rescued from a snow cave, after becoming bogged down in deep snow in the back country behind Treble Cone.
The rescue was triggered by the Rescue Coordination Centre in Wellington after one of the skiers contacted his father in the United Kingdom to say he and his companion were safe and had built a cave at End Peak, near Wanaka.
Wanaka Land Search and Rescue chairman Bill Day helped managed the retrieval from Wanaka and praised the skiers for being ‘‘prepared enough’’ for an overnighter in zero degrees, even though that had not been their intention.
‘‘They made the right call, particularly with the weather coming in,’’ he said.
The men, one from Scotland the other from Germany, had a satellite phone and a personal locator beacon among their equipment, Rescue Coordination Centre media spokeswoman Sandra Ford said.
They used the phone during the night to ring one of the men’s father in the UK, then activated their rescue beacon at 8am yesterday.
The father was named as the emergency contact person for the personal locator beacon, so when the Rescue Coordination Centre rang him to say they had picked up the signal, the father was able to say he had already spoken with his son and the pair were safe in a snow cave, waiting for retrieval.
Aspiring Helicopters pilot Tim Coldicott flew alpine cliff rescue team members Paul Rogers and Mal Haskin to the men’s snow cave and extracted them by about 9.15am.
Further details about the men were not available.
Wanaka police search and rescue coordinator Aaron Nicholson could not be contacted for comment.
‘‘They didn’t intend to be there overnight but they certainly had enough gear to survive. They basically got stuck. So they snow caved and they did quite a good job of their snow cave and survived the night in relative comfort, before flicking off their beacon at 8am. One of them was able to text his father in the UK. They were not injured, just needed extracting,’’ Day said.
Rogers and Haskins are professional mountain guides. Day said the helicopter dropped them a short distance from the stranded ski tourers because of avalanche concerns.