I started off Saturday with more data collection at the beacon climbing centre. I am just into double figures and given that I need ideally 48 people I have a way to go. I have to thank a few of the readers of this blog who have volunteered to be participants, if you climb V2 boulder problems indoors or above then please get in contact with me, as I am still desperate for more participants.
I got back and then decided to go for a run in the nice weather, its the first run since I was ill, so was harder than I was expecting, but I managed over and hour and a fairly sizable hill. No sooner had I returned and the pager was going. Lots of team standby by then having read through the waiting list of message, I was about to have a shower when the pager went again, ‘team to nant‘.
Spent the afternoon chasing what was in my opinion a non-job, we had already had call outs for grazed heads which we didn’t respond to, but the job I was sent out on was a ‘blister’ on the Llanberis Path. I mean a blister, whilst the helicopter was sent out for a more serious report of a broken leg, it seemed a waste of my taxes to have it involved in a ‘blister’ incident.
We were lucky, as we had a very enthusiastic Cambridgeshire Search and Rescue Team assist us (carry the stretcher up and down), who were amazed that they had come across three jobs in one day. Trying to explain to them that this is common, and that I think our record was 8 jobs in a day, made them realise that the Llanberis Mountain Rescue Team is the busiest in the UK. We are now at over 122 call outs for the year, passing our previous annual record and we still have the rest of the year.
There are various thoughts on why we are so busy this year, but the credit crunch is one theory where the number of people holidaying at home has increased, meaning that the sheer volume of people on the mountain is just ludicrous. My friend took some family friends up yesterday, and was shocked at the numbers of people on the hill.
My personal opinion, is that at present the volume of call outs is getting out of hand for a part-time voluntary team. Whilst the voluntary model has worked across the UK for many years when Mountain Rescue was conceived one single team wasn’t having what will probably be approaching 150+ rescues a year (3 a week!). So whilst government might well not want to be involved in funding a national mountain rescue service there is perhaps a growing case for a small number of individual teams.
The pressure on Llanberis Team is growing and having spoken candidly to a few active members, there is growing feeling that time individuals dedicate to the team is on the increase and I for one with commitments to work and my MSc studies have found it hard to attend every call out and haven’t made it to a training session in over 6 months.
If you would like to support the Llanberis Mountain Rescue Team, then myself and fellow team member Brian are running the Llanberis Marathon (Click to give) to try and raise much needed funds, we are after all a self funded and essential 999 service.