{"id":189392,"date":"2025-12-18T03:59:07","date_gmt":"2025-12-18T03:59:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/189392\/"},"modified":"2025-12-18T03:59:07","modified_gmt":"2025-12-18T03:59:07","slug":"aoraki-mt-cook-search-called-off-for-climbers-after-ice-avalanche","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/189392\/","title":{"rendered":"Aoraki Mt Cook: Search called off for climbers after ice avalanche"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Department of Conservation (DoC) was made aware the pair had not returned to Plateau Hut on Monday morning<\/a>. <\/p>\n

The search and rescue effort spanned three days, when weather allowed.<\/p>\n

\u201cOnce a weather window appeared, the DoC Search and Rescue team, supported by The Helicopter Line [THL] and New Zealand Police, were able to conduct a search of the mountain,\u201d said Aoraki area commander Inspector Vicki Walker.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe first opportunity for an aerial search occurred late Tuesday evening, however, they were not located. However, because they noted their intentions, it drastically narrowed the area we had to search.\u201d <\/p>\n

The search was ramped up on Wednesday using a Recco Sar detector suspended under a THL helicopter. <\/p>\n

\u201cWith the aid of the detector and search and rescue staff, we were able to identify a key area of interest and located some items of climbing equipment,\u201d Walker said.<\/p>\n

\u201cA visual investigation of this area has led to the determination that the overdue climbers have been caught in a significant ice avalanche within a known icefall hazard zone on the upper Linda Glacier,\u201d Walker said.<\/p>\n

\u201cBecause of the scale and volume of material involved, we don\u2019t believe this avalanche was survivable.\u201d<\/p>\n

DoC Aoraki\/Mt Cook operations manager Sally Jones said the area remains too unstable for ground crews to access, or for a recovery operation to be attempted.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a tragic outcome, and our thoughts are with the climbers\u2019 family and friends.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Linda Glacier is an unforgiving alpine environment. Conditions can change rapidly and even highly experienced climbers are exposed to unexpected hazards including icefall, crevasses, avalanches and extreme weather,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAoraki is a place of immense beauty and significance, but it also can be extremely brutal in terms of what it can throw at those who attempt to climb it.\u201d<\/p>\n

While aerial reconnaissance had not been able to pinpoint where the bodies of the climbers might be, Walker said police would consider a recovery operation if warmer weather allowed.<\/p>\n

\u201cSadly, for now, we can\u2019t reach them, and they lie in rest on the maunga and our sympathy is with their wh\u0101nau,\u201d Walker said.<\/p>\n

The two climbers are the fifth and sixth mountaineers to die on New Zealand mountains in the past four weeks.<\/p>\n

Two climbers perished on Aoraki\/Mt Cook in late November, while two more died on Sabre Peak last weekend.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Department of Conservation (DoC) was made aware the pair had not returned to Plateau Hut on Monday…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":15314,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[74,101609,118647,118646,1559,101610,4194,2082,305,42,2027,6501,10048,43,6662,675,1870,165,40,38,41,39],"class_list":{"0":"post-189392","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-after","9":"tag-aoraki","10":"tag-aorakimt","11":"tag-avalanche","12":"tag-called","13":"tag-climbers","14":"tag-cook","15":"tag-for","16":"tag-have","17":"tag-headlines","18":"tag-ice","19":"tag-missing","20":"tag-mt","21":"tag-news","22":"tag-off","23":"tag-police","24":"tag-search","25":"tag-their","26":"tag-top-news","27":"tag-top-stories","28":"tag-topnews","29":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189392","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=189392"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189392\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15314"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=189392"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=189392"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=189392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}