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Published: 15.09.2021
Last Updated: 29.09.2021
When Chris Hill was hiking Hooker Glacier, an 11km block of ice on New Zealand’s South Island at the base of Mount Cook (Aoraki), he found an old backpack.
Looking inside he found an old camera, and decided that he would try to get the film developed.
When the grainy images were revealed, he took them to the Police and to New Zealand’s Land Search and Rescue, to see whether the person in the images could be identified.
As a result, the images were widely shared and the story behind the backpack was revealed.
One of the men in the photos was confirmed to be 29-year-old Australian Steve Robinson, with the photo take just moments before he was buried by an avalanche.
Twenty-four years ago, in 1997, Robinson and climbing partner Richard Stiles were attempting to summit Mount Cook, the highest mountain in New Zealand (3,724 metres).
On March 28, after ascending the technically challenging Sheila Face, Stiles and Robinson endured one of the coldest nights they had ever experienced.
During the descent from the summit the following day, the pair had stopped for a well-earned rest on a ledge near Porter Col at 2,600 metres and removed their backpacks.
At the same time a huge block of ice, described as the size of an apartment building, crashed into condensed snow further up the mountain, which set off an avalanche.
In the roar of noise and wind, Stiles managed to jump out of the path of the avalanche by leaping quickly down the slope.
When the avalanche finally stopped, Stiles was blown hundreds of metres down the slope by the blast of wind.
With no sign of Robinson, or his backpack, Stiles managed to find a snow stake in the debris, and make it safely off the mountain to the Empress Hut to raise an alarm.
Now a doctor based in the Australian town of Lithgow, seeing in the images on Facebook was a shock after all this time:
He continued:
It turned out that conditions were warmer than expected which can cause unpredictable conditions on the mountain.
The loose snow conditions they encountered during their climb were described as “intimidating and scary”.
Stiles added that Steve was:
At the time of his death, Mr Robinson was a doctorate in solar physics at New South Wales University in Sydney, who was working on developing photovoltaic cells before his fateful adventure.
He was also an accomplished mountaineer, surfer, kayaker and rock climber.
Stiles himself has never gone mountaineering again after losing his friend. However he hasn’t lost his thirst for adventure, having crossed the Bass Strait, separating Tasmania from the Australian mainland, in a kayak.
Steve’s sister Christine told of the shock after seeing the photos:
She described the discovery of the backpack as being like a gift from beyond the grave.
Resources:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/sep/02/photos-from-beyond-the-grave-camera-discovery-reveals-climbers-last-images-before-fatal-avalanche
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/126216749/camera-discovery-reveals-last-images-of-mountain-climber-before-he-died
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