Terry Harch, a 29-yer old Australian, was found on August 2 alive and in “reasonably good condition” after having survived the trial by digging a makeshift shelter in the snow to preserve body warmth.
A member of the local Rescue Coordination Centre, Geoff Lunt, has been quoted by Radio New Zealand as saying that, “we think he dug himself a snow-dug out shelter and that’s helped his survivability over these last few days.”
It was announced that Mr Harch was found, to much surprise, in “reasonably good condition” only suffering from “minor frostbite.”
According to reports, search-and-rescue teams flagged a signal sent from Harch’s distress beacon at some point on Tuesday, but were prevented from reaching the man by hostile blizzards and thunder.
Mr Harch’s story comes on the heels of a similar incident at the end of July. Russian climber Alexander Gukov, 42, sent out an SOS signal from Latok mountain in Pakistan after his fellow traveler, Sergei Glazunov, 26, fell to his death. Mr Guvok was rescued nearly a week later by Pakistani authorities.