Climbing risky but not reckless
A series of tragedies have seen alpine climbing in the headlines recently. Michael Hayward looks at the risks involved and the statistics on the sport.
For John Palmer, climbing has an ‘‘intoxicating mix of adventure, excitement, [and] athleticism’’, ideally in a pristine natural environment.
The New Zealand Alpine Club president elect understands it is a sport with ‘‘inherent risks, many of which are not controllable’’.
He said the adverse consequences of that risk are severe. However, Palmer does not see the sport as reckless.
‘‘Obviously the club, we’re always keen to promote climbing as an activity, and we wouldn’t do that if we thought it was irresponsible.’’
It has been a bad season for alpine climbing in New Zealand, with four deaths in the mountains since December.
On April 24, New Zealand climbers Conor Smith and Sarwan Chand were reported overdue from a climbing trip in the Darran Mountains, Fiordland. Their bodies were recovered the next day.
The pair were part of the New Zealand Alpine Team, a group of the country’s top climbers who operate a mentor scheme to develop young talent. Four members have died in as many years, leading to some questioning whether the team created overconfident young climbers.
The body of a Czech climber was recovered by Search and Rescue from Mt Aspiring on December 28, after he fell several hundred metres from the northwest ridge.
On December 1, experienced Christchurch mountaineer Charlie Catt fell to his death on Mt Harper, Arthur’s Pass.
Overseas, famous Swiss mountaineer Ueli Steck, recognised as one of the best in the world, fell 1000 metres to his death in Nepal on April 30, while acclimatising for an attempt on a route on the West Ridge of Mt Everest. Steck was known for climbing difficult routes very quickly and without a partner or protection such as a rope.
On his website, Steck put up a post on his upcoming attempt saying he had repeatedly asked himself why he did it.
‘‘The answer is pretty simple: Because I want to do it and because I like it. I don’t like being restricted. When I climb, I feel free and unrestricted – away from any social commitments. This is what I am looking for.’’
Each of these fatalities dominated headlines when they happened.
Palmer said it was unfortunate media interest in climbing ‘‘tends to be most acute when there’s an incident or accident’’.
‘‘We have thousands of members who go climbing every week, all over New Zealand, and all over the world, and the vast majority have great experiences and return safely. You just don’t read about it in the news.’’
Canterbury Mountaineering Club president Hugh Logan said he thinks some people are too quick to judge.
‘‘Every time when there is a number of mountaineering deaths, always people leap to print, and they rush to judgment.’’
He said he thought safety was taken ‘‘more seriously in the community now than it ever has been in the past’’.
Logan said in terms of the standards of the day, ‘‘something that’s extreme today is no more extreme comparatively than something that was being done 30 years ago’’.
The difference was that in the past these events were not in the headlines, but people in the mountaineering community knew about them, said Logan.
‘‘The same things are happening but there’s readier knowledge about them.’’
The rise of social media and development of small, rugged cameras capable of photo and video have meant people involved in extreme sports can document their exploits.
Some professional athletes such as Steck have online videos that have reached over a million views.
Logan said he was not convinced social media was driving New Zealand mountaineers to do more extreme things. He also didn’t believe pushing for professional sponsorship was a driver for climbers to take risks in New Zealand.
‘‘The only people who are doing it for a day job are guides, and they’re being paid to guide.’’
Palmer also said it was not realistic to expect professional sponsorship in New Zealand, given the population.
‘‘It’s not like the States where any kind of fringe or adventure sport has a professional element to it.’’
He said a person’s willingness to take risk came down to the individual more than the level at which they are operating.
‘‘I think beginners can also be hungry. I don’t know that it’s unique to people at the limit.’’
Palmer said experience was a key – but not the only – component in effective risk management while climbing. However, there was a ‘‘chicken and egg’’ issue in getting it.
‘‘How do you get experience as a climber? You go out climbing. So inevitably there’s a conundrum that you have.’’
The New Zealand Mountain Safety Council (MSC) has spent over 50 years working to encourage safe participation on outdoor activities, and collect and analyse data on those activities to gain insights that can be applied to safety.
Its numbers show that climbing is risky compared with the other outdoor activities they monitor, such as hunting, tramping, mountainbiking and trail running.
Research from the MSC found that there were an average of 3.2 deaths from mountaineering annually, based on data spanning 7 ⁄ years. Falling is the leading cause of death, responsible for 71 per cent of fatalities.
They also found that for every 8355 active New Zealand mountaineers, one died annually. This was a higher rate than for other outdoor activities. For trampers, one in 128,227 did not make it home and for every 47,201 hunters, one was killed.
Comparatively, Ministry of Transport figures from 2000 to 2014 show for every 10,965 people in New Zealand, one died annually in a vehicle accident. However, fatalities are becoming less frequent over the period monitored.
The MSC report found that people aged 35 to 49 accounted for 42 per cent of mountaineering deaths, despite accounting for 32 per cent of mountaineering participants.
Similarly, those aged 25 to 34 made up 33 per cent of mountaineering deaths, but only 23 per cent of participants.
Men make up the majority of deaths and injuries in mountaineering, but also the majority of participants.
The report noted that mountaineering was subject to good and bad years, with annual fatalities in the years monitored ranging from zero to six. It should also be noted the low total number of fatalities and relatively short period sampled means the figures could be easily skewed by good or bad years.
MSC chief executive Mike Daisley said annual fatalities in mountaineering tended to be either zero or one, or five or six.
He said focusing on fatalities ‘‘was always going to lead to potentially the wrong conclusions to be drawn’’.
Those in the mountaineering community were not foolhardy, and had ‘‘a real appetite for educating themselves better’’, said Daisley.
‘‘They’re a community of people that want to go into these environments, they get a strong reward out of it, but they’re not stupid. They want to come home.
‘‘We’re just constantly pushing the availability of all those tools and education to the community so we can keep those fatalities and incidents as low as possible.’’
The MSC has released a deep analysis of statistics relating to hunting, and are currently working on one relating to tramping. Daisley said mountaineering statistics would be done after that.