A Franz Joseph glacier guide sat covered in his own blood, awaiting rescue after being caught in an avalanche at the top of the Landsborough Valley.

Jamie Hareb is recovering from a broken ankle, ruptured ACL, and head-to-toe cuts and scrapes.

He had mere seconds to try to climb out of the avalanche's path as it bore down on him.

He said it picked him up, whipped and spun him around, smashing him into a rock, his legs were twisted, turned and crushed.

Hareb tried to jump to the side, clinging to a rock before being flung again onto the avalanche.

Eventually he was able to get back up and jump off - waiting a couple of hours for rescue after activating his tracker beacon.

He told Newstalk ZB he was hiking in a mountain gully at the top of the Landsborough River when he heard a huge crack and looked up to see a massive wave of snow and ice separating from the mountain.

He had about five seconds to get as high up one side of the gully as possible.

But the avalanche kept growing higher and whipped him off his feet, taking him for a ride.

Hareb battled to stay afloat on the fast moving wall of ice and snow, and eventually managed to jump off the avalanche and set off his tracker beacon before being rescued by helicopter.

For info on avalanches head to avalanche.net.nz or the Mountain Safety Council website - mountainsafety.org.nz