Climber hailed hero after night trek to get help

Published: May 9, 2007 | 6185th good news item since 2003

A climber who cheated death in a fall that killed one of his friends is being hailed as a hero after it making a night-time trip across glacier country to raise help.

The man and his two companions fell almost half a kilometre down Mount Aspiring, but tragically, only two of them were lucky enough to survive the fall.

One of Michael Garrilot’s companions, 20-year-old Austin Hancy, died in the 400-metre fall but a third climber, Jesse Kappmeyer, battled pain to trek out for help – leaving his injured friend wrapped in a sleeping bag.

Rescuers say the men are lucky to be alive.

“Once we started flying the route and going ‘whoa, these people have fallen this far,’ it was pretty surprising that the guy was still doing pretty well. And even more surprising at the lack of injuries that the guy had,” said Gary Dixon of Wanaka Search and Rescue.

The men were roped together on the Bonar Glacier when one of them fell, dragging the others almost half a kilometre down onto an ice shelf.

Despite a broken collar bone, Jesse Kappmeyer walked throughout the night to French Ridge Hut and raised the alarm about 11:00pm.

Police are praising his decision to walk out.

All three men were American, studying at Lincoln University.

The climber who died, Austin Hanchey, had just been visited by his mother who gave him an ice pick and climbing rope.

His uncle told Radio New Zealand Hanchey was a keen climber.

“I don’t know how much experience he actually had with ice climbing, and that may have unfortunately been one of things that leant itself to the accident,” his uncle said.

University staff spoke of the grief among students, who they said are working hard to support one-another.

Sadly, news of his death has not yet reached all of his friends, with one posting a message yesterday on Hanchey’s MySpace page asking how Mount Aspiring was, and requesting that he call.

Published in Heroes
See also: www.tv3.co.nz