Beacon essential, hunter says

Richard Thompson considers himself a "new" hunter.

He's not an old-style kiwi bloke who can get ready to hunt in the time it takes to brew a stiff cup of tea, in his own words.

He doesn't have a hunting knife that you could get a feed off from the last bloody hunt.

He doesn't own a holey swanny or a rifle with baling twine for a sling.

What he does have is a unique turn of phrase and an ability to reflect on life's turns.

That's something many of us would end up doing, when you're lying in hospital with a broken neck and femur, unable to get to sleep.

Mr Thompson, 52, fell down a gorge while hunting near Martinborough in June, after a rain-soaked track gave way underneath his boots.

He was rescued by Life Flight's Westpac rescue helicopter two hours later.

He started penning his thoughts, although he couldn't literally see what he was writing, during the nights he lay in hospital.

His goal was to pass a message on to fellow hunters: get prepared, get geared up, and take a portable locator beacon with you.

Today, Mr Thompson is back at his home in Mangaroa, near Upper Hutt, with a substantial neck and head support and a cast leg.

A nurse has to visit regularly, to stop the skin of his scalp growing over the bolt threads.

He says he hopes to be hunting in Wairarapa again in November, and you can be sure this time he'll put a locator beacon on his belt.

He does in fact own one, but didn't think to unpack it when he spotted a deer on the way to a hunting hut with his mate and two youngsters. It was in a clearing about a kilometre away.

"It was a beautiful day," he says.

"Normally, I take a head torch, camera, walkie-talkie, portable locator beacon, knife."

But, hoping to get an early kill, he just grabbed his rifle and knife, and a walkie-talkie, and headed out.

"That bloody deer, it was in quite thick scrub.

"I bashed through it, got the rangefinder out ... 400 yards.

"I thought I could get closer."

Suddenly, he was plummeting, and the only thought was preserving his rifle.

"I couldn't work out why I was going so fast.

"I knew I was in trouble, I was like a kid skating down a grass hill - I didn't tumble once."

It was a 20m slide, with a 5m sheer drop into a creek.

He says he must have blacked out, because he next remembers lying in the creek thinking, "crikey, I need to get out of this water.

"I picked up my leg, and it just fell beside me.

"I had no pain, I don't remember having a sore neck."

The walkie talkie was his lifesaver, he says.

"I need help, have broken leg," he radioed.

His mate replied, saying he would go for help.

"You would have thought it would be easy to find me, but it took about an hour.

"I was conscious throughout, but in shock. I was cold, shaking, I didn't hear anyone calling out."

Mr Thompson was eventually located and winched out.

It turned out his right leg was broken cleanly across the femur. He also had a broken neck.

Today he thinks about how much easier a PLB would have made things, especially since he does not know of any other hunter who carries one.

It prompted him to write a homily to hunters while in hospital.

Whether you're an "old-school hunter" or a new hunter like him, everyone should be better prepared, he wrote.

"A lot of hunters are loners, get on their own for days on end.

"They are living out there, they can see deer out the window of their houses.

"I'd call them real hunters - but they are the ones that should have a PLB."

"It would make a bloody good Christmas present, if only for the peace of mind for their families."