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| Stob Coire Nam Beith click to enlarge all images |
Late
February, bitterly cold and moonlit to the point of making a head torch largely
redundant. Alan, a very experienced local climber has set off earlier that day
with a local lad who was learning the winter ropes, literally. Their route Northwest Gully Stob Coire Nam Beith. NW Gully is a modest guidebook 450m grade
II/III winding its narrow way up past "The Pyramid" and
"Sphinx" rock features on the biggest face of Glencoe, Stob Coire
nam Beith which has an alpine feel. The route if taken direct can be harder on
steeper ice and a few have been stuck on it over the years. The rock
architecture is truly fantastic and although the route is 450m in the guides,
it’s actually an awful lot longer than that to the summit where the route
really ends if you take the right variation which is best. That day the snow was bullet proof neve and in great condition. No
mobile phones back then and no great shakes to be a little late back, so Alans
wife Anne was not too concerned when he wasn't home by five o'clock, although,
like myself we often expected to be back 4 o'clock-ish. When the pair had not come back by Eight
o’clock, Anne phoned Hamish. He wasn't at all concerned as Alan is experienced
and no point in calling the team out when they were probably just finishing
late. Anne however felt something wasn't right and called Hamish back again later
only to get the same response. Meantime, as one of Alans friends she called me
and asked what she should do. I said I would get a couple of the lads from next
door, and we would go up have a look. I radioed the team and said four of us
were going up for a nosey to put her mind at rest. My neighbours at that time
were Peter (Chalky) White on one side, and Paul Mills on the other. Chalky was
a forecaster with the SAIS, ex RAF MR, and a good mountaineer and rescuer. Paul
"Millsy" was working as an independent Mountaineering Instructor
after leaving Glenmore Lodge and at that time was staying in a wee damp hovel
of a cottage next to Tigh Dearg which has since been knocked down. Gary Latter stayed
in in it before him. Malcolm Alans son one of the fittest lads in the rescue
team came along as obviously worried about his dad.
We
set off up into the corrie moving pretty fast as it was now about ten pm at night making our way around the right of the corrie to near the "Rognon"
a raised feature on the West side up towards Hidden Gully where we started
shouting. Faintly we heard shouts back and could just about make out that one
was injured. This changed things immediately and we moved into rescue mode. I called
up the team, and asked for a rescue helicopter. Millsy and I headed down
towards "the Gate” a feature in the Corrie and started soloing up Summit
Gully crossing over into NW Gully at a little shoulder. By this time, it’s
getting on for eleven at night. We climbed up steep neve and snow ice until we
reached the right fork of NW Gully and the variation finish. Chalky was able to
direct our lights towards the shouts and a faint beam of light he was able to
see occasionally. The right fork goes up the Sphynx, then to the Mummy where
there is an ice pitch up to the shoulder. This is probably old-fashioned grade
IV short and steep and a bit of a sting in the tail after such a long climb. We
got to just below their belay at about midnight when SAR 137 a sea king, the
first we had seen as the Wessex had just been retired arrived. It flew in the
hover above us. It was horrendous from downdraught, blowing spindrift and the bitter cold. Alans leg and ankle was very badly broken and the Tibial plateau
in pieces, and tibia open # out the knee after a fall and a crampon catch. The
young belayer was hypothermic and going down from the cold. The helicopter
stayed in the hover above us for about 30 interminable minutes as it was a
highly technical winching operation from difficult ground. John Greive could be
seen in the door looking down on us being deluged and buffeted and was ready to
be winched down if needed to help. The winchman did a fantastic snatch rescue
courtesy of a knife and balls of steel. We never again doubted the Sea King. Previously
we thought it wouldn't be up to the job like the Wessex. That was proved wrong
time and again.
That
left two of us in the gully smothered by spindrift and frozen, with a back climb of 400m+.
Bugger the abseiling we decided, as we were too cold. The gully had loaded up
with slab to a depth of about 40cm or more from the hover and a funnel effect
from the summit slope fan, so we had to be very careful as it was on a solid
base. It’s a complicated area, but I
knew my way around it as well as anyone could, so headed down trying to avoid the steeper section
of NW Gully above Isis Buttress. I knew a shortcut down a narrow corridor right
of Isis to go down. I remember dropping into the gully facing in, both axes
placed, and a whump and roar as it went off below my feet, I had to climb over
the 30cm crown wall with Millsy following. We didn't give it much thought, shit
happens. You don’t sign up for MR in Glencoe if you want an easy time and if
I’m to be honest I often enjoyed the unexpected mountaineering challenge and
unpredictable nature of it especially in technical terrain.
We
continued down into the corrie where we met Chalky and Malcolm and in the wee
small hours as dawn was coming up descended back down the path to the Elliot's.
The Elliot's were all in bed, the team had gone home long ago, so we felt a bit
of a let-down as no welcome party and tea and medals. So with nothing for it
but home for a brief sleep, and for me at that time back up a hill to Ski
Patrol at Glencoe for day shift and broken skiers.
Alans
tough but needed a long rehab after reconstruction at Raigmore. The young belayer survived and would
certainly have died that night if out any longer, as might Alan. It's a dilemma
often occurring in mountain rescue where experienced folk are late, and no one
wants to embarrass them by calling out a rescue team too hastily. When is the
right time to worry and take action? There are no right or wrong answers. I had put
my own wife in that position when late back from a new winter route. However, I think
for Alan it was a bit too close a call and were it not for his wife’s instincts
and his resilience the consequences could have been tragic.
As
mentioned, I was very late one night, and Fiona called John the team leader and
he rightly said we would be fine as I was with Arthur Paul and Andy Nelson, and
we couldn't all be dead! Tongue in cheek
and Johns way of allaying fears. He was right. John had good keen instincts and
saved many lives by taking no chances and getting the team out early on many
future occasions when leader. Hamish made a call that night with Alan, and we
as our climbing brother’s keeper, we made one too. Rescuers and Mountaineers are
one and the same and God help mountain rescue if it loses that ethos and
becomes just another risk averse collection of wanna bee’s. There is no right
and wrongs and such are the heavy burdens of a rescue team leaders’ role. The
public are probably unaware just what a big responsibility that is for MR teams
like Glencoe and Lochaber. In my own time as both deputy leader and team leader
I also had to make them on occasion and a degree of luck, judgement and
serendipity is involved.
I
felt I needed to get this tale down. Surviving 10 hours hanging on a rope with
a shattered leg with a relatively novice young climber freezing, while cajoling
them to stay with it and encourage them to survive while your very broken took a lot of courage from Alan.
Alan has written an excellent and much better written account of his ordeal which was featured in the Glasgow Herald. As a journalist as expected its a work of great craft and damn good read. I have tried to get it from the Herald archive but no luck. Below are scans of the actual newspaper article and even though bits are cut the quality of the writing and tale is obvious. My writing is a poor comparison but perhaps serves as another side of the tale.
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| Below NW gully. SAR 137 taxi hovering its way up to pick two dead avalanche victims from an earlier incident where they were avalanched out off the same spot as us |
