A contractor is dead after his ute plunged about 170 metres down a scree bank near the Mt Hutt ski area in poor conditions yesterday.

Mt Hutt ski area staff were first on the scene of a fatal crash which claimed the life of a man they knew, and worked with, this morning.

A little piece of Sir Edmund Hillary's family history - a century-old villa belonging to his grandmother - was removed from its site in Mt Eden last week.

A 7-year-old girl has made a fearless climb of the towering Remarkables mountain range.

Climber Heather Rhodes has no memory of the 300m fall that almost took her life on the Cameron Glacier in the Southern Alps in November.

Police say they are confident the body recovered from Nelson Lakes National Park yesterday afternoon is that of missing British tramper Andrew Ian Wyatt.

Search and rescue teams looking for a British tramper have found a body at the bottom of a 100m cliff.

A Kiwi skier was shocked to discover his Swedish skiing partner had fallen to his death on Aoraki-Mt Cook just days after they set a new record together.

Ice picks were held up in a guard of honour as the caskets of climbers Nicole Sutton and Hiroki Ogawa left a church in Auckland today following their joint funeral.

The New Zealand Alpine Club will carry out an independent review of its trip to Mt Taranaki after two climbers died over Labour weekend, it was announced today.

A huge avalanche crashed frighteningly close to a rescue party as they treated a woman who had fallen some 300 metres down a Canterbury glacier after her snow anchor apparently detached.

A Swedish extreme-altitude skier who plunged 600m to his death near the peak of Aoraki-Mt Cook had set a new record on the mountain just days earlier.

Police are investigating the deaths of climbers Nicole Sutton and Hiroki Ogawa who died on Mt Taranaki over Labour Weekend.

Alpine experts say conditions on Mt Taranaki can turn within minutes, and whether climbers make it down alive or not depends solely on the decisions they make.

They died side by side - sending a final text expressing fears for survival. Today rescuers have been able to winch the pair off Mt Taranaki.

The conditions have been atrocious. Mr Smith and some of his team, him grey with fatigue and his hands still not fully functioning, ponder at how she could have lasted so long.

A top female New Zealand rock climber is gearing up to attempt a daring world- record free climb - and beat her male rivals on the way.

A Search and Rescue team made a desperate but unsuccessful attempt to save a man who plunged 200m down an icy Mt Cook slope.

On a Himalayan journey, Winston Aldworth has his breath taken away by the scale of Everest.

This is the story of New Zealanders Marty Schmidt and his son Denali, who died trying to summit the world's most dangerous mountain.

Images from Marty and Delani Schmidt's attempted climb of K2.

Since the birth of his first child this year Jamie Vinton-Boot had toned down his risky mountain climbing. He was killed yesterday by an avalanche.

Despite a number of avalanches on The Remarkables mountain range in recent years it is not considered a danger zone, says a mountain safety expert.

Sequoia Di Angelo knows exactly why her father and brother continued up treacherous K2 while the rest of the team retreated.

Europe's most affordable ski slopes are in Poland, as Jared Savage discovers

The world's most perilous peak will be the final resting place for a New Zealand father and son who were attempting to scale it.

A 3D depiction of Sir Edmund Hillary conquering Mt Everest will premiere at the prestigious Toronto International Film Festival in September.

A man believed to have died with his son while climbing the world's second highest mountain, K2 inspired a generation of Hawke's Bay people to embrace the outdoors.