Industry News
A viral video has been making its rounds on social media showing a rescue team taking a stretcher down with a first responder sitting on the sled, desperately performing CPR. We are not going to share the video on SnowBrains since it has crystallized that the person being resuscitated did not survive. The victim was a 17-year-old boy with dual Indonesian and Australian citizenship, who had just graduated school in November 2025, and had been on holiday in Nikseo, Japan.
The incident occurred on January 7 at around 3:50 p.m. at the Niseko Tokyu Grand Hirafu Ski Resort in Kutchan Town. According to police, the teenager was skiing near the boundary between the Grand Hirafu and Hanazono resort areas. The boy had been skiing in Niseko with friends but was alone at the time of the accident. It is assumed that due to thick snow falling—as evidenced in the vide—the boy did not see the boundary rope and skied into it at full speed. The boundary rope in that place had been stretched between poles positioned roughly 10 meters (33 feet) apart.
An employee at the resort contacted police after receiving a call from another skier reporting a person falling on the course. The teenager was found unresponsive and was rushed to hospital by emergency services. Despite everyone’s best efforts to save the boy, he later died in hospital. A judicial autopsy conducted on January 9 determined the cause of death to be suffocation due to compression of the neck. Police said there were no other injuries or signs of trauma.
Authorities are continuing to investigate the circumstances surrounding the incident, including the course layout, rope placement, and events leading up to the collision.
The victim was later identified by his school as Rylan Pribadi, a former student of Brisbane Grammar School (BGS) in Australia. In a statement, the school said it was “with heavy hearts” that it acknowledged the passing of the 2025 graduate, who died while “doing what he loved most.” Rylan joined BGS as a boarder in 2022, entering Year 9, and quickly became a respected member of the boarding community. He was a passionate footballer and played a key role in the school’s Premiership-winning First XI in 2025. That same year, he also served as a Boarding Prefect.
The school described him as friendly, approachable, and deeply committed to those around him, noting that his death has had a profound impact on students, staff, and alumni. Brisbane Grammar School extended its condolences to Rylan’s parents, Reza and Jacky, his two sisters, and his extended family and friends, saying the community “mourns the loss of a bright and valued member of the BGS family.”
It is the second former BGS student that has died in a ski accident in the last six months. In September 2025, a former student died in Thredbo, Australia, when he hit his head while skiing.
