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Men who went up Ben Nevis during blizzard in trainers and without map ‘extremely sorry’

By Press Association

February 13 2020, 3:19pm

Four men who were rescued from Ben Nevis amid severe weather have thanked the team who saved them.

The group, who were said to have hugely underestimated the challenge of the climb, thanked the Lochaber Mountain Rescue Team (LMRT) and sent gifts of whisky, wine and chocolates.

The men called 999 on Monday after getting lost on Ben Nevis in blizzard conditions without proper equipment, three of them wearing trainers.

Mountain rescuers save trainers-wearing walkers from ‘horrendous’ Ben Nevis blizzard conditions

Lochaber Mountain Rescue Team said the men had no ice axes, crampons and apparently no map, and were not dressed for winter mountaineering.

They were said to be verging on hypothermia when they were airlifted to safety and there were doubts they would have survived many more hours.

The group was taken to Belford Hospital in Fort William and all have since been released.

In a statement, LMRT said the men – who were visiting Scotland – had admitted a “significant error of judgement and are extremely sorry for the results of their actions”.

The team posted an image on social media showing gifts from the casualties which included a card, wine, chocolates, whisky and £200.

Thanks to everyone for their messages of support to the Team – very much appreciated. The incident has created a huge…

Posted by Lochaber Mountain Rescue Team on Tuesday, 11 February 2020

Thanks again to everyone for the overwhelming support and comment the Team has received this week. It probably has been more difficult managing this interest than the call-out – albeit it was of our own making. Hopefully we have raised enough awareness of the issues of education of the risks associated with taking access to our mountains in winter.As way of a bit of a warning of what is coming this weekend – that is "named storm Denis" ( who picks the names – no disrespect to any Denis – but sounds like we are about to hit by a storm of bureaucracy by a civil servant) please see short section of film taken on way up to rescue the guys on Monday. This is what to expect if you fancy a wee walk on the Ben between Friday and Monday.We have had a lot of inquiries about the use of the What Three Word app – it was a life saver on Monday. However, it is not the panacea, as like all technology it can fail – all it needed was for the casualties to have been a few metres lower and they would have had no mobile coverage to relay their location to us, or the batteries could have easily have failed in extreme cold. A small miscommunication when the information first came through to us gave a location in Canada. If you plan to use smart phone technology to navigate or think it will give you info/connectivity to get you out a situation, it could fail. You should always not be without having a map and compass and more important, the skills to use them. Same goes for winter gear such as ice axe and crampons (be able to use) and suitable clothing.Also as a wee foot note to the rescue, just so that everyone is aware that the guys do know how lucky they were, the thank you note from them is attached. We have used the Ferrero Roche to redact the names (note the product placement- we are trained at the Ryan Renyolds Gin school of marketing). We could just as easily have used the The MacCallan, Vinalba Wine or Thorntons, but the three chocolates were all that were left after Hannah's yoga (bendy class to the Team) last night. Seriously, if any of our images are used commercially, please give a donation through our just giving page We are happy for people to use our images but if you are a commercial organisation please consider making some consideration. https://www.justgiving.com/lmrt/Donate

Posted by Lochaber Mountain Rescue Team on Thursday, 13 February 2020

In a statement, LMRT said: “These were very young guys who without any prompting made a very generous gesture which is very much appreciated.

“Not everyone rescued appreciates that we are not full-time or not paid to be at their beck and call.”

They also called for the public to “cut the guys a little bit of slack” as the incident had not resulted in any serious casualties and had helped raise the profile of the work the team does and mountaineering safety.