One of the country's leading experts in mountain safety is likely to be called in to determine whether a permanent safety rope should be installed along the treacherous Cascade Saddle in the Mt Aspiring National Park, west of Wanaka.
Department of Conservation regional planning manager in Christchurch Don Bogie, who earlier this year became a member of the New Zealand Order of Merit (MNZM) for services to land search and rescue, was named by Otago-Southland coroner David Crerar in his report into the death near the saddle of German tourist Frank Spychalski (38).
Mr Spychalski died from severe head injuries on November 29, 2012, when he slipped and fell several hundred metres while attempting to negotiate the steep slopes below ''the Pylon'' near the saddle.
Ten other trampers are understood to have died in the same area.
A Doc spokesman told the Otago Daily Times yesterday while arrangements were not yet ''set in concrete'', the work was likely to be done by Mr Bogie or an engineer early next year.
Mr Bogie was the first person mountaineers Mark Inglis and Phil Doole saw when a rescue team brought to an end their 14-day ordeal, trapped on the summit ridge of Aoraki/Mt Cook, in 1982.
In his report, Mr Crerar noted following Mr Spychalski's death a ''consultative group'' of Doc staff and search and rescue personnel ''discarded'' the idea of installing what it described as safety ''furniture'', such as fixed ladders, chains and ropes because it considered maintenance would be ''unmanageable'', that they would be ineffective when covered with snow and they could possibly be avalanche prone.
The group also considered such permanent structures could lead users into further danger.
Mr Crerar acknowledged the difficulty of equipping the route but other advice he had received led him to believe a wire rope on posts was ''technically possible'' and he had received a number of submissions ''generally supportive'' of a fixed rope.
''The difficulty, in that equipping the route in this manner may attract users of lesser competence, is acknowledged.''
Mr Crerar believed signage to ensure users were left in no doubt about the hazards of the saddle route was ''a minimum'' and he noted Doc in the Fox Glacier area had changed the colours of its warning signs to make them distinct from its green and gold information signs.
Mr Crerar said the consultative group considered all those who died in recent years had ''specifically ignored, or failed to adequately act on'', either the signage or advice of Doc staff.
''The feeling of the consultative group was that some people do not accept advice given and are therefore the authors of their own subsequent misfortune.''
But Mr Crerar did not agree with the group when it categorised Mr Spychalski as ''one of those people you just cannot tell''.
Mr Spychalski, a Google IT expert, was a ''fit, competent, responsible tramper'', Mr Crerar said.
''Frank Spychalski did not argue with or ignore the advice ... He did not, however, acknowledge or understand fully the dangers of the terrain in which he was traversing.''
Cascade Saddle
After the death of German tourist Frank Spychalski on the Cascade Saddle in the Mt Aspiring National Park in November, a group of search and rescue experts considered the risks the saddle posed and summarised them in these terms: ''The climb from the Matukituki Valley above the bush line to the Pylon on the ridge is a poled route which works its way up the edge of a spur.
The route has numerous risks attached; being exposed, steep, loose stones and rocks, slippery snow grass (when wet or covered in snow), is extremely dangerous (long fall lines, some leading into near vertical gullies). The area where the snow remains the longest and presents the greatest risk is near the top of the climb to the ridge. The fall line at the bottom of the snow-patch leads to a spur which has steep near-vertical gullies where victims have fallen.''
- From the report by Otago-Southland coroner David Crerar
