Three trampers are recovering after being plucked from the frozen upper slopes of Mount Taranaki on Sunday, in a rescue that police say came close to ending in tragedy. Anyone wanting to see the wind behind it can check our interactive wind map, which tracks weather crossing the Tasman and Pacific up to five days ahead.
Two of the group were seriously injured and a third was trapped by the ice when the alarm was raised about 10.30am, with the trio scattered across different parts of the mountain. A rescue helicopter was sent up almost straight away, but low cloud and rough weather kept it from reaching them. Instead, an alpine search and rescue team member was winched in above the group and made his way down the slope on foot to find them.
The weather eventually cleared enough for the helicopter to return, and all three trampers were lifted off the mountain by about 4.30pm and taken away for medical care. The operation stretched across most of the day, ending a search that had begun in poor visibility and freezing wind.
Taranaki Police Acting Sergeant David Bentley said the outcome could easily have been much worse. He thanked the volunteers and staff who turned out on a bitter winter day, singling out the Ruapehu Alpine Rescue Organisation, Taranaki Alpine Cliff Rescue and St John for being “invaluable in their efforts to help everyone off the mountain safely”.
“Without the Taranaki community rescue teams’ efforts today, and had the weather not cleared in time, it was very likely the situation would have ended tragically,” Bentley said.
Photographs taken by one of the search and rescue members and released by police showed just how hostile the mountain had become. Thick ice and snow coated a mountain hut and buried the surrounding vegetation, a reminder that the maunga in midwinter is a very different place from the gentle green cone people see from New Plymouth on a clear summer day.
Taranaki Alpine Club member Glen Hodges, who has taken part in searches on the mountain over many years, told RNZ the peak was currently “glazed” with rime, an icy crust that forms when water droplets in freezing fog stick to rock and snow and turn solid.
“Anything above 1400 metres is really hard at the moment. You can’t really walk on it unless you’re quite skilled,” Hodges said.
That warning carries real weight. Taranaki looks approachable, with its near perfect cone rising straight out of the farmland and a road that carries walkers most of the way up to North Egmont before the tracks even start. Yet it is one of the most dangerous mountains in the country. More than 80 people have died on its slopes since records began in the 1890s, and the mountain safety organisations that watch over it regularly warn that its friendly appearance is exactly what catches people out.
Recent history bears that out. In September last year, 69 year old Vladimir Levchenko became separated from his group while climbing the mountain and later died, with searchers following a trail of blood to find his body. In February this year, five climbers were injured, one of them critically, in another major rescue on the same slopes. Sunday’s callout was the latest reminder that Taranaki punishes small mistakes harshly.
Part of what makes the mountain so deceptive is how fast it changes. A climb that begins under blue sky can turn into a whiteout within an hour, and the smooth summit cone that looks like a straightforward walk in photographs becomes a sheet of hard ice in winter, where a slip has almost nothing to stop it. Ice axes, crampons and the skill to use them are essential above the treeline, and even experienced alpinists turn back when the rime builds up the way it has this week.
Police used Sunday’s rescue to repeat their standing advice that only extremely experienced and competent climbers should be on the mountain in the current conditions. Bentley urged anyone heading into alpine or remote country to be realistic about their own skill and preparation.
“If you are heading into alpine or remote areas, please ensure you are an experienced tramper, as anything can occur on the mountain,” he said. “Plan carefully and carry appropriate emergency equipment, including a personal locator beacon.”
A personal locator beacon, or PLB, is a small device that sends an emergency signal with the carrier’s location to rescue authorities at the push of a button. They can be hired cheaply from many outdoor stores, visitor centres and public libraries around the country, and search and rescue teams say they routinely make the difference between a fast rescue and a drawn out and dangerous search. In this case the trampers were found and reached in time, but only because the weather relented and a volunteer was willing to be lowered onto an icy mountainside to walk down to them.
The rescue also underlined how much the country leans on unpaid volunteers when things go wrong in the backcountry. The alpine cliff rescue and alpine rescue crews who climbed into Sunday’s conditions were not on a payroll for the day. They were local people with the training and the willingness to go up a mountain that everyone else was being told to stay off, and three trampers are alive because of it.
Have you climbed Taranaki in winter, or been helped by one of the volunteer rescue teams. Share your story in the comments below.
This article was written by AI, briefed to report the facts, hopefully without some of the bias people bring to the job 🙂
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