Official search for tramper ends

Search dog team (from left) Mark Allen, of Twizel, Dave Krehic, of Christchurch, and Brent...
Search dog team (from left) Mark Allen, of Twizel, Dave Krehic, of Christchurch, and Brent MacDonald, of Queenstown, at Dart hut. Photo by Marjorie Cook.
Auckland tramper Irina Yun (36) has not been found, despite an intensive search yesterday of the Dart River and gorge near Dart Hut by police and Wanaka LandSAR volunteers.

Three teams of searchers were flown into the hut, including three search dogs brought to Wanaka for the operation.

The official search has now been completed but police will maintain a "limited continuous search" and return if new information comes to light.

A private search by Ms Yun's ex-husband Oleg Amiton and Russian mountain guide Vladimir Fomin, of Hanmer Springs, will continue.

While Wanaka-based searchers believe Ms Yun most likely drowned in the Dart River during a heavy rain storm on New Year's Eve, Mr Amiton said yesterday he continued to hope his former partner was alive.

Six psychics had told him, separately, they believed she was lying under a rock downstream from the Dart Hut, so that was where he and Mr Fomin would concentrate their search, he said.

"So far, we don't have any assumption she is dead . . . Why not [be alive]? It is only 10 days. It is not three weeks, right?" Mr Amiton, a Chinese medicine practitioner, said.

Wanaka search co-ordinator Sgt Aaron Nicholson told volunteers at yesterday morning's search briefing if Ms Yun was not found "we will leave it to nature to sort out".

Sgt Nicholson and other searchers were optimistic because river levels had dropped significantly since earlier searches, exposing wide pockets of silty sand.

Although disappointed not to have a result, the volunteers had been proactive and were comfortable they had done as much as they could in high priority areas.

Up to 400 hours were put into the search and $30,000 spent on helicopters.

Wanaka LandSAR's resources were stretched yesterday, with two emergency call-outs to attend, one ending with the recovery of a lost paraglider safe and well.

A beacon alert in the Lindis Valley-Ahuriri Valley area was also investigated but it was believed to be a false alarm.

Meanwhile, Sgt Nicholson was escorting the coroner on a scheduled aerial view of the sites of fatalities in the Mt Aspiring National Park during the past year.

Oxford search and rescue volunteer Dave Krehic and his German short-haired pointer, Stig, were called in to assist Queenstown-based volunteer Brent MacDonald and Labrador Ella and Twizel-based volunteer Mark Allen and Border collie, Koda.

 

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