Hectic spell for mountain rescue heroes
Reporter: Ken Bennett
Date published: 22 May 2025
A scene from one of last weekend's three rescues
Last weekend was a busy one for Oldham Mountain Rescue Team, with three callouts in total.
On Saturday they were called to Ogden Reservoir with reports of a teenage boy coming off his mountain bike and suffering injuries to his hip, ribs and arm.
The team immobilised the casualty with a vacuum mattress before carrying him up a steep slope and across a field to a waiting helicopter.
He was then flown a short distance to an ambulance.
Sunday saw the team respond to an incident at Ashway Gap where a female walker's knee had locked out whilst coming down the path.
In a lot of pain and unable to walk, the team gave pain relief and immobilised the knee before putting her on a stretcher.
The team carried the casualty with the assistance of the stretcher wheel to the fence line before sledging the rest of the way down the grassy slope to the path below to the waiting ambulance.
During this rescue another call came through with a request for help, also in the Dovestone area, from a walker in Birchen Clough unable to continue due to an injured ankle.
The casualty and their companion were making their way down the challenging rocky path when the incident happened.
The team quickly sent two team members around to that location, one of whom was a trained Remote Rescue Medical Technician to assess the casualty.
And with two separate incidents underway, the team requested additional support from their neighbouring team, Holme Valley Mountain Rescue.
The casualty was given pain relief; their ankle was splinted and then they were loaded onto a stretcher ready for evacuation.
Due to the technical nature of the path in Birchen the team formed two rolling lines of team members who slowly and carefully passed the stretcher down between the lines to the bottom of the clough, safely delivering the casualty to a team vehicle.
They were then driven to a waiting ambulance further down the valley.
Twenty-five Oldham Team members and 12 Holme Valley Team members were involved in all rescues, which totalled 150 person hours.
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