Midsummer weekend is always a busy time for the Lake District rescue teams, as masses of Three Peaks Challengers make use of the shortest night to head for Scafell Pike.

Scafell Pike summit

This year was no exception, with the Wasdale team responding to numerous calls. Julian Carradice, leader of the Wasdale Mountain Rescue Team, said Wasdale was very busy. The Green, he said, was ‘absolutely heaving’.

It took the team half an hour to get its Land Rover through the parked vehicles in Wasdale.

Team members got little sleep last night, as they responded to numerous calls.

Mr Carradice told grough: “About 9 o’clock we had two calls almost simultaneously. The first was about two walkers overdue on the back of Scafell. We found them on the side of Piers Gill.”

Rescuers walked them off the mountain. The other call concerned a man who had fallen on the fell and sustained suspected broken ribs, but he managed to walk off the hillside unaided.

Mr Carradice continued: “We were then called to four Three Peakers who had lost the path on Scafell Pike and were getting cold. We found them not far from Lingmell Col. That was about 11.10pm last night.”

Apparently, rescuers were told that the men’s compasses had stopped working on Scafell Pike. “It must be a solstice thing,” said Mr Carradice.

“Then we had a woman who was missing three walkers, but that got resolved.

“There was another very involved call from someone who didn’t know whether his party was still on the mountain or on its way to Snowdon.

“In the end, we were out just once, but at one time we had four calls on the go at the same time.”

Of the plethora of calls to Wasdale MRT, just one involved an injury – the walker with suspected broken ribs – and he managed to get himself out of difficulty.

The final call today came to aid a party of Duke of Edinburgh’s Award expeditioners, one of whom had aggravated an existing shoulder injury.