A Wanaka man understood to be an experienced climber is in the intensive care unit at Dunedin Hospital in a serious condition, after falling 6m while his climbing party was returning from the Darran mountains near Milford Sound, in Fiordland.
The man was brought to Dunedin in what helicopter crew described as a ''seriously ill'' state yesterday morning.
That followed a night in the open, after he fell about 11.30pm on Sunday.
The four-man party set off an emergency locator beacon, but torrential rain and electrical storms meant a helicopter could not provide immediate help.
Instead, a Te Anau search and rescue team tramped to the site, arriving about 4.30am.
Southern Lakes Helicopters operations manager Lloyd Matheson said the alpine climbing group had been on a 10-day expedition, and was tramping during the night to the Milford Sound Highway where its vehicles were parked.
The group was only about 5km from the road.
Mr Matheson said the group had left an established track that had become unusable because of the weather.
Once the beacon was activated, the Rescue Co-ordination Centre in Wellington organised police at Te Anau to send in a ground party, Mr Matheson said.
One member of the climbing party had also walked to the road to raise the alarm.
The search and rescue team, which included a nurse, stabilised the man and cared for him until the helicopter arrived at dawn yesterday.
Mr Matheson said the country was ''dense bush on a sheer face in a river catchment'' by the Donne River.
The man had fallen in ''a real steep area'' covered with fallen trees, in a heavy beech forest in torrential rain.
''Just totally miserable,'' was his description of the conditions.
The rain had not stopped in the morning when the helicopter arrived and was ''absolutely persisting down''.
''We managed. through long-line extraction, to extract him from his predicament.''
The man was initially flown to Milford Sound, where a doctor stabilised him, before he was flown to Dunedin.
District Command Centre deployment co-ordinator Senior Sergeant Brian Benn, of Dunedin, said the two members of the climbing group left at the scene had also needed assistance, and were evacuated by the second helicopter.
It was understood they were suffering from hypothermia.
