But even then, it's not immoral to talk about the very real tradeoffs involving the search and rescue personnel and resources that could be devoted to doing other things, and this indeed comes up when someone is doing something particularly dangerous in the mountains and ends up requiring a spectacular rescue. These rescues are always followed by arguments about who should bear the cost and what should happen if people can't pay. And surely nobody has the obligation to go into the mountains to save someone who was knowingly taking the risk. We live in a world where search and rescue already exists, so it seems natural and obvious to say that they should try and save everyone they can, but are they responsible for a death if they save so many people in a week and decide they can't go out again?

In my prior post, I wasn't trying to suggest that we should willy-nilly leave people to die, just that we don't live in a world of infinite resources and that I don't personally believe it's horribly immoral to let people make choices even when those choices can have terrible consequences, assuming they know the risks.

You have a point. Actually, in the case of search-and-rescue that's already a moral decision that is made each time. In case the rescue mission itself is seemed to dangerous for the team, it's not attempted.

Logically maybe we shouldn’t, but humans aren’t known for doing everything logically. If you know someone is in trouble and you have the ability to rescue them it is human nature to do it, no matter the cost.