Hiker’s friends thank those involved in 13-day search for Hadi Nazari

ABC NEWS (Australia)

More now on rescued hiker Hadi Nazari who was found after almost two weeks in the Kosciusko National Park. Reporter Adriane Reardon has spoken exclusively to Josh and Jess Dart who came across the missing 23-year-old when they were hiking.

Transcript

00:00We were walking up from the Blue Lake and we came to this point where there's this beautiful

00:06view to the right and my friend James, he was a much quicker hiker than me, he's very

00:12fast, very speedy.

00:14He actually was the first there and he went out to look at the view and he was standing

00:18on the rock and he looked down and he could see, well firstly he heard someone like shouting

00:25out, yelling and then he looked down and could see a speck of a person but very small

00:32and so then we started yelling and shouting and saying, are you alright, are you injured?

00:39And yeah, so me and Jess, we had caught up to him by then and we started to, yeah, both

00:45getting closer and closer to him, trying to shout out and get his attention.

00:49The closer we got we could tell that he was actually asking for help and so we kind of

00:54scrambled down the side of the valley and as we got closer, that morning I'd actually

01:01seen a poster of him in the National Park Office while we were buying the tickets and

01:05I recognised his scarf because he was wearing it in the photo.

01:09And then when we were close enough to hear each other I was like, what's your name?

01:14And then he shouted out that his name was Hardy and I was like, oh my gosh, I think

01:17this is the guy that has been missing and then we asked him, how long have you been

01:21out here?

01:22And he said, eight days and then when we finally got closer I said, you went missing on Boxing

01:29Day, right?

01:30And he's like, yeah, I've been out here for eight days, all I've eaten is two muesli

01:34bars.

01:35I showed him the calendar on my phone, I was like, it's the 8th of January, you've been

01:38out here for 13 days and we both burst into tears and hugged each other and yeah, it was

01:45a really special moment.

01:46As this was all unfolding, we had other hikers around us that could see what was happening

01:51and they started coming down and surrounding him as well.

01:54So it was kind of this big group of us all coming around and there was people offering

01:58water, people offering muesli bars, chocolates, etc.

02:03All these different things.

02:06And then he was just so thankful, he was just like, praise God and then when he saw the

02:12helicopter come over, he got all excited, he stood up and he went to shake all our hands

02:17and he was thanking all of us for finding him and then we just helped him up the hill

02:24up to the helicopter.

02:25I think the best moment was actually in that time as well, we gave him a phone to call

02:30his family and when his mum answered the phone and heard his voice, you could just hear,

02:35the phone wasn't even on speaker, but you could hear it sounding out through the speakers

02:39of the phone.

02:40We could just hear the emotion and I was getting teary and just hearing him talk to his family

02:45for the first time.

02:46It was a special moment to be a part of and we just happened to be in the right place

02:51in the right time.

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