A 7-year-old boy from Nagoya was abandoned on Mount Fuji by his own father after he became too tired to continue hiking. The incident sparked outrage across Japan, raising serious safety concerns.
The boy was a first grader and was hiking with his 48-year-old father and his older brother (a middle school student) on Thursday morning, August 20, 2026. The family decided to climb Japan’s iconic mountain together via the Fujinomiya trail.
The little boy complained of being tired when the trail reached the sixth stage, at a height of about 2,490 meters (8,169 feet). His father asked him to “wait here” and kept on walking up the mountain with his older son. The father was planning to leave the 7-year-old alone for almost seven and a half hours.
Around 7:30 a.m., local staff spotted the boy sitting alone on a bench. Rain was falling, and fog was beginning to gather as the worker invited him inside and contacted the police.
The police tracked down the father, who was near the eighth station, and ordered him to return immediately for the safety of his child.
Luckily, the boy was unharmed and safely reunited with the family. The father later expressed remorse, saying he made a “rash decision.” The police gave the couple a serious warning about their carelessness since the abandonment of a child is deemed “unacceptable” regardless of the need to abandon the mountain climbing idea. This case has elicited a lot of criticism on social media.
2026-08-21 17:44:00
