Rescuers are winched from the RAF Sea King on to the summit of Ingleborough. Photo: Trevor Brooks
An injured walker got a surprise lift from a Yorkshire peak at the weekend, thanks to a major rescue exercise.
The 54-year-old woman from Preston was airlifted from the summit of Ingleborough by RAF Sea King after picking up a wrist injury. Luckily for her, three rescue teams and a crew from RAF Leconfield were on hand to fly her off the 723m (2,373ft) felltop and then drive her back to her car.
The exercise was run by Dave Gallivan and Pam Hickin of the Cave Rescue Organisation, based in Clapham, in the shadow of Ingleborough. CRO members were joined by volunteers from Upper Wharfedale Fell Rescue Association and Swaledale Mountain Rescue Team in a two-day training session that also included officers from North Yorkshire Police and the RAF.
The exercise culminated in the unplanned, real-life rescue of a climber suffering a suspected heart attack on Giggleswick Scar.
Members from the CRO and Upper Wharfedale teams worked with Yorkshire Ambulance Service paramedics and a doctor to get the man from the crag to the waiting Yorkshire Air Ambulance.
CRO spokesman Rae Lonsdale said: “The site is particularly difficult for a rescue, being steep with very loose scree and edged with dense woodland and scrub. It is understood that the 63-year-old Cheshire man had been climbing, but had descended to rest. He was flown to Leeds General Infirmary.”
The training session, held at Clapham and Ingleton, dealt with patient ‘packaging’, stretcher carrying, vertical stretcher hauling, ventilation of fumes and foul air in caves and mines and preserving possible crime scenes. The volunteers from the three teams also gained experience of North Yorkshire Police’s major incident communication system.
The three teams, which all conduct rescues both below ground and on the Yorkshire Dales’ fells, practised stretcher evacuations from caves, rock lifting with air bags and splitting rock with plug and feathers, a technique that was called into use last year when a rock climber in the Lake District fell and jammed her leg in a fissure.
Eighteen team members and police officers were then flown up to the summit of Ingleborough and winched on to the fell.
Mr Lonsdale said: “The informal conclusion seemed to be that everyone would benefit if the teams trained together more frequently than of late, as equipment and procedures varied from team to team.
“It was also very helpful to have police involvement, to improve mutual understanding.”
Upper Wharfedale team members also helped over the weekend with a stretcher evacuation near the Springs Canal in Skipton, and CRO volunteers were called yesterday, Monday, to help find a party of a dozen students who were overdue in the Horton in Ribblesdale area, after failing to return from a circular training walk.
Mr Lonsdale said: “Their route was meant to go no further than Birkwith and Old Ing before returning to Horton, but somehow they reached Greenfield, where local advice soon put them straight.
“CRO members found nine of the group between Old Ing and Birkwith, walking towards Horton, then a separated group and their supervisor near Sell Gill. All were returned to Horton in Ribblesdale for some helpful advice. UWFRA helped by checking the Langstrothdale end of the potential route, but were stood down when the group was found.”
The last incident was the CRO’s 33rd of the year.
