Windy Tops

Category: musing

  • A sad Tararua tale of the usual sorts of reasons

    I’ve held off writing much about the November 2016 accident in the Tararua, near Alpha Hut, where two people died. There hasn’t seemed to have been much new to write about which I haven’t already covered previously in this forum.

    Last week I received a copy of the final Coroner’s report, which has now been released. Flick me an email if you’d like a copy.

    Background

    There’s not much new in the coroner’s findings that has not already been reported. It makes for some depressing reading. The findings describe that both men were fit, and that one had “significant tramping experience in New Zealand”. Neither had ever visited the Tararua, however, and “experience” is often a subjective metric. It’s not a word that always correlates with ability in all circumstances.

    The two men appear to have made plans to attempt what’s commonly known as the Neill-Winchcombe circuit after a work conference in Wellington. The trip was a last minute decision. Clear intentions had seemingly not been left with anyone, except that they intended to stay at a hut, probably Alpha Hut.

    There’s a relatively direct route to Alpha Hut from their starting point, but they instead opted to follow a much longer, circular route. Maybe this decision was made if they thought the direct route appeared to short and boring, but exactly why this decision was made is unknown.

    Without clear intentions being available, the main sequence of events has been reconstructed from other evidence.

    Here’s a map of the area.

    The pair left the Waiohine Gorge carpark, inland from Greytown, in the early morning of Saturday 19th November. From there they tramped west to Cone Saddle, climbed to Cone, then north-west to Neill Saddle and around to Winchcombe. After Winchcombe, the route crosses to the west and eventually meets the more popular Southern Crossing track at the peak of Mt Hector. Hector is a relatively short distance south of Kime Hut, but they instead walked south-west, around the Dress Circle and eventually towards Alpha Hut where they most likely meant to stay the night.

    They never reached Alpha Hut.
    (more…)

  • Another two too many in the Tararua Range

    Two deaths occurred near Alpha Hut in the Tararua, in late 2016. I didn’t write about them at the time, but today Stuff published an article regarding the Coroner’s investigation.

    The men were attempting to walk the standard Neill-Winchcombe circuit. It starts at Waiohine Gorge, into Cone Saddle and up to Cone (.1080). Then there’s a steep dip into Neill Saddle before climbing up to Neill (.1158), across the ridge to Winchcombe Peak (.1261), then to the junction of Mt Hector (.1529) before continuing along the main Southern Crossing route back to Alpha Hut. From there, there’s a route via Bull Mound and Cone Hut back to the starting point. Here’s a topo map of the region.

    The route is a good fit trip, but it’s also very exposed to the worst sorts of conditions which the Tararua Range is capable of throwing at people. The route is notorious because there are very few good places to bail out if something goes wrong. For much of the route along the tops, the only practical directions to take are either forwards or backwards.

    The two men were found about 900 metres short of Alpha Hut, sparking confusion about how they managed to get so close without reaching comparative safety.

    I’ve read this article a few times, and each time I’m finding it more and more incredible about what these people were trying to do compared with how badly they seem to have been prepared. On one hand, I’m sure people have gotten away with worse than this and, hopefully, learned something. But still…..

    These distances could be misleading, because the exposed ridges could be demanding and difficult, Rix said. In his opinion, the two men were not wearing adequate protection from the weather, which they may have struggled through for a while.

    Neither had a maps, compass, GPS or light source.

    The idea of this seems almost unfathomable to me, considering what they were attempting. Maybe they’d planned to do all their navigation with a smartphone? Maybe they’d committed the route, and everything around it, to memory?
    (more…)

  • Thoughts on another Tararua rescue

    The Southern Crossing of the Tararuas has been in the news a few times lately. Shaun Barnett wrote this nifty description of the Southern Crossing for the April 2018 edition of Wilderness Magazine, although a feature on the Tararua Range in NZ Geographic from around mid 2016, by the same author, is much more comprehensive.

    Meanwhile the RCCNZ stated that last Sunday night, 25th March, and leading into Monday morning, a man’s life was undoubtedly saved by a group he met at Kime Hut after he arrived in a hypothermic state. A Stuff report provides further information, adding that he’d been with a companion.

    A PLB was triggered, and a LandSAR team walked up to Kime overnight. Low cloud meant a helicopter couldn’t safely reach Kime at the time. He was eventually assisted to Field Hut, at a lower elevation, and air-lifted out. His condition meant he stayed overnight at hospital. It’s good news in the sense that things could have been much worse, but weren’t.

    This case is interesting because the Stuff report suggests that the man mightn’t have been well equipped for the conditions in which he found himself. It reports that he’d previously competed in the Tararua Mountain Race, and it reads as if some of the gear he carried might have been more consistent with that sort of event.
    (more…)

  • An interesting case of concessions in parks

    The Taranaki Daily News has an interesting story about happenings in Egmont National Park. One of the guides there is concerned about fitness groups and personal trainers arranging summit walks up the mountain, allegedly illegally if they don’t have concessions and are effectively acting as guides.

    At least one of the accused guides has responded by saying she stresses that she’s not guiding, and the walk is open to anybody.

    Much of the article focuses on the safety aspects of guiding on the mountain without necessarily having the type of experience and background that a concession holder might be required to have. That’s a fair enough point because it’s the main concern the guide has. I do, however, find the legal side of this to be at least as interesting.

    The part of the law in question isn’t strictly about safety, and guiding has nothing directly to do with it. It’s about commercial activities in parks, and whether a concession is required from the Department of Conservation.
    (more…)

  • The Commodification of Wild Places

    Tourism and commercial enterprise have been part of New Zealand’s outdoors for at least the last century. The Milford Track spent much of its history as a relatively high grade tourist attraction. For a time it was largely exclusive, and that only changed after an act of civil disobedience which asserted the public right to explore a National Park. Closer to my own home, the popularly known Southern Crossing route across the Tararua Range had its modern beginnings with an intent to attract tourists to the region by creating a tramping route, and providing huts for accommodation.

    DOC’s mandate recognises this. Section 6 of the Conservation Act, which defines DOC’s responsibilities, states that DOC should foster the use of natural and historic resources for recreation, as long as it’s consistent with other requirements, and allow their use for tourism.

    The distinction between recreation and tourism has become more important recently, though.
    (more…)

  • A fuller narrative of the Taranaki alpine tragedy

    In 2013 I wrote briefly about the (then) recent alpine tragedy on Taranaki.

    A very detailed, and interactive, report about that event has now been published by Stuff.

    The article is sourced from multiple in-depth interviews with people directly involved. It covers both the accident and the rescue operation, and its narrative flows from the beginnings of decisions which combined to cause things to unravel into a disastrous situation, through the attempts to plan and deploy rescuers, and eventually to the eventual musings and hindsight of what people wished had happened differently.
    (more…)

  • Pest Control and Social Licence

    Lately I’ve had some issues with getting out tramping, mostly with life having been usurped by a couple of bundles of life experience. I expect the hiatus will end in time.

    Last Thursday 28th September, however, I went to a Royal Society hosted expert panel discussion on the topic of gene editing and potential applications for New Zealand’s predator free 2050 goals. The resulting discussion isn’t up yet, but was being recorded by Radio NZ. It will be available sooner or later.

    It was a fab discussion to attend. It inevitably steered towards the realisation that getting a social licence from NZ’s population is very important if the predator free goals are to be met. Enough people who live in New Zealand need to be comfortable with what’s done, why it’s done and how it’s done, or it’ll never happen.
    (more…)

  • The absurdity of Ruataniwha

    I’ve not previously written here about the Ruataniwha Dam situation. Today’s decision in the Supreme Court, however, is highly significant. It’s not just significant for the Ruahine Range, but for the future of all Conservation Parks and Forest Parks in New Zealand.

    8615033377_c8a7c1484e_c-7919031
    Gareth and Craig walk up part of the Makaroro River that’s proposed for flooding,
    29th March 2013.

    As background, Hawke’s Bay Regional Investment Company (HBRIC, owned by Hawke’s Bay Regional Council) wanted to build an irrigation dam to support more intensive farming in the district. The only practical plan included flooding 22 hectares of Ruahine Forest Park, next to the Makaroro River. For this to happen, the Minister of Conservation and DOC arranged to swap the land in question for some alternative land that could be added to Ruahine Forest Park.

    The decision agitated many people for many reasons, but the most relevant legal point is that the Conservation Act only allows Stewardship Land to be traded away. It doesn’t allow for the trading of Specially Protected Areas. To circumvent this, DOC first down-graded the status of the land to Stewardship Land so it could be lawfully traded, but the law’s unclear about whether it’s legal to downgrade Specially Protected Areas for this reason.
    (more…)

  • Media fanning the flames of regulation

    Details are still thin, but it’s sad to learn of another death on Mt Taranaki. Not much detail has yet been released, except that an accident appears to have occurred somewhere in the vicinity of Ambury Bluff and Humphries Castle on the north-eastern side of the mountain [approximate map]. The conditions were winter conditions, but until more official details emerge I don’t think it’s fair to speculate too much.

    The article, from the Taranaki Daily News, is interesting for other reasons, though. It appears to be planting an idea for some kind of regulation, even though there’s no evidence presented that anyone’s actually asked for it.
    (more…)

  • FMC’s new magazine website

    Federated Mountain Clubs has, over the last short while, been quietly introducing its new Wilderlife website (think “wilder life”) .

    It’s a magazine-style website which, so far at least, revives much of the really good content that was previously only seen in the FMC Bulletin (now renamed ‘Backcountry’). It also has space for contributions. Wilderlife is definitely worth a look just for its magazine content, but the site goes deeper than this.

    For one thing, the site includes an online, and free, edition of Safety In The Mountains. Safety In The Mountains is FMC’s flag-ship and straight-to-the-point handbook of good and practical advice for how to get around whilst remaining safe when outdoors. The content was thoroughly revised in 2012 (my review is here). FMC’s emphasis with the booklet has always been to keep it as affordable and available as possible. The online edition remains current and full of worthwhile advice. Maybe FMC’s movements in this area have been encouraged by the Mountain Safety Council’s recent shift away from training and towards more basic safety messaging, combined with research.

    Wilderlife’s Magazine area is already reviving older FMC Bulletin Backcountry Accident reports. Whilst a grim topic, these reports have highly valuable information for learning about how and why accidents occur and how to avoid them.

    It’s definitely worth browsing. I hope Wilderlife continues growing and becomes a comprehensive resource.