bad planning on your part may constitute and emergency on a the part of a lot of people.
extremely lucky they had cell phone contact at all. do not rely on cell phones in the NZ mountains, second incident in as many weeks, both relied on cell phones to call for help. Do not expect a cell phone will save you in NZ, 99.99 percent of the time it will not have connection.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/artic ... d=11517249