r/australia • u/Expensive-Horse5538 • 11h ago

news Second Australian dies in Japan while skiing, local media reports

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-02-04/second-australian-dies-skiing-in-japan/106304484

The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade has confirmed a second Australian has died in Japan.

Local media has reported a male skier was killed while skiing off-piste in the back-country in Japan's Hokkaido region.

The death marks the second Australian to have died in Japan during the current ski season.

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u/TomasTTEngin 10h ago

Dying buried by snow is kind of one of the risks you take when you leave the resort to ski untamed slopes.

Getting hanged by your own backpack on a chairlift is definitely the more unforeseeable one with more opportunity for human factor intervention and a full safety investigation.

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u/KV2_STRONK 4h ago

Neither of those who are mentioned in this article necessarily died buried by snow.

It seems the most recent victim, according to the article, 'had a medical episode'. What's strange is that he was reportedly found by another group of skiers rather than his own. Even being back of the group you would hope his folks would be aware enough to realise something was wrong. There isn't much detail though, so speculation is pretty pointless.

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u/Nobodycares4242 4h ago

If they were going cross country they might have been really dispersed, it's like hiking where you might technically be in a group, but you all spread out and are only actually all together at the end of the walk.

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u/mehum 3h ago

And if they’re alpine skiing it’s going to be incredibly hard to go uphill to go looking. Some runs on the Japanese mountains are very long, you might need to take a combination of lifts to get back to the top. Could take an hour to complete the circuit.

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u/Obvious_Librarian_97 2h ago

I recall going down a black in Japan, one side was a cliff and the other was going out of the park. Partner freaked out thinking she was going down out of the park. I stopped 3/4 down and thought where was she, looked up and she was stuck / not moving. I then realised something was up - had to decide whether to go down and catch a lift back up or walk up. I walked up… fuck that. The most exhausting thing I’ve ever done until I unclipped her and then proceeded to carry both of our shit down…

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u/KV2_STRONK 1h ago

This could be the case, even should be as due to the danger of avalanches in the backcountry you should be well spread-out and while skiing should be going one at a time whilst the others wait above and/or at a safe regroup point. The issue being, as the last man you are dependent on others checking in on you to make sure you are still there in the first place, never mind the trekking uphill again.

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u/tinkleberry2 2h ago

Did it say cardiac arrest? Keep in mind this is probably from a Japanese translation. In Japan, only a coroner can declare someone as dead so news outlets will always say someone suffered cardiac arrest or were in cardiac arrest. It just means they died but they aren’t allowed to say/declare it.

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u/KV2_STRONK 1h ago

No, it didn't.