The New Jersey governor is under attack for remaining on his family vacation in Florida while his home state digs out from an avalanche of snow.
He said the men, who had started their climb at 0930BST, had been about two-thirds of the way to the summit when the snow slope started to avalanche.
The climbers were on a steep slope where there was snow, which meant an avalanche was possible, but there was no reason to suspect it would happen then, he told CNN affiliate BFM TV.
"Flooding, snow, high winds, avalanche risk, slips and rock falls can all occur at any time of the year, " says Christine Officer, program manager at the DOC office in Te Anau (a two-hour bus ride from Queenstown), which manages the Milford Track.
The examiner's report said Yu, who was caught on Red Mountain in a separate avalanche, suffocated under the snow.
Police said a slab of snow and ice was thought to have triggered the avalanche but did not know what had dislodged it.
Sportscotland Avalanche Information Service (SAIS) has reported snow covering summits in the range.
Kenny Kramer, director of Northwest Weather and Avalanche Center, said 20 to 30 inches of snow fell over the weekend.
Last month, Daniel Maddox, 41, from Clackmannanshire, died in an avalanche while off-piste skiing near the Glencoe Mountain snow sports centre.
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Their guides then tell them there has been an avalanche, that they will have to overnight in the snow, and they need to begin building snow shelters immediately.
Two people caught in the avalanche on the Mont Blanc massif were found alive in the snow afterward.
They must hope that the snow-storms on the far side of the mountain will not trigger an avalanche.
"The avalanche has actually gone into a gully, and in some places the snow is about 40ft deep, " he said.
The camera invariably begins with an almost entirely snow-filled screen, then dramatically zooms in on a slaloming blip causing its own harmless avalanche.
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Mark Diggins, co-ordinator of the Scottish Avalanche Information Service, said weather conditions were fairly dry and there had been little snow over the last four days.
An 'avalanche' which uprooted trees on a Denbighshire hillside popular with walkers has led to warnings of snow slips being issued.
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