Japan to charge rescue fee on Mount Fuji during off season
The fee is among a series of measures Yamanashi prefecture is introducing to deter reckless climbers.
Japan to impose rescue fee on Mount Fuji during off-season
Starting next year, anyone who tries to climb Mount Fuji outside the peak climbing season and then needs a helicopter rescue will have to pay for that service, officials overseeing the mountain’s northern side said.
The charge is part of a set of steps being introduced by Japan’s Yamanashi prefecture to discourage careless and underprepared climbers.
A comparable fee of 8,000 yen ($51; £38) for every five minutes is already in effect in nearby Saitama prefecture for other mountain areas and will serve as a benchmark.
Yamanashi officials will also require people planning to climb Fuji during the off-season, which lasts from early September until July of the following year, to provide detailed climbing plans.
"We ask the general public to refrain from climbing during the off-season. We hope that these measures will cause people to rethink what climbing Mount Fuji during the winter is like," Yamanashi Governor Kotaro Nagasaki said on Monday.
Authorities in Yamanashi and adjacent Shizuoka prefecture, which oversees the southern side of Fuji, have reported an increase in off-season and unplanned climbs, some of which have resulted in climbers being stranded.
Shizuoka officials say they will fine people who do not register their off-season climbing attempts and will step up efforts to keep climbers away from restricted zones.
They did not announce a helicopter rescue fee.
Mount Fuji’s official climbing season runs from July to early September, and around 200,000 hikers attempt the summit each year.
Climbing outside those months is strongly discouraged, though it is allowed up to the fifth of the ten stations.
Even so, most mountain huts and toilet facilities are closed during the off-season. Weather and trail conditions also tend to be harsher.