#saturdaystory

Once, I rescued a hiker from the east face of Cradle Mountain in Tasmania. She had taken a wrong turn while descending, and had fallen onto a ledge from which she could neither climb down nor up. Miraculously, she was unhurt! This is the mountain:

I was leading a hiking trip, and there was another company leading out a group at the same time, who happened to have an extra guide because training. We heard someone yelling, and were wondering ‘where the fuck is all that noise coming from’ before we twigged.

So we settled our respective groups and had a powwow. What are our options? attempt rescue, or get out the sat phone and call in a chopper.

You already know what we did, because I told you. The decision tree went like this:

Plan A: call the chopper. This would take hours, meaning flying in the dark and rescue in the dark. So we developed plans B and C: approach the cliffs and assess the casualty - are they mobile, can they walk, how stressed are they (in scales of ‘fucktonnes to megafucktonnes')

…and then either call in the whirlybird or see if we can do the extraction. Remember, we have 25 people, three guides, two satphones. Its a big deal if we remove any people or equipment from that equation, since guides have a duty of care and are not protected from negligence

…so myself and the senior guide go and assess the situation. By now we’ve recruited a few keen spotters from my group who are happy to forgo early dinner to help out. Also remember this whole drama plays out with an audience - every decision is on show!

…and can communicate with the stranded hiker. We also see that its about 30-40m of an easy climb (maybe 5.0 to 5.1) to the casualty, she just is freaked out and can’t make that hard step. Computing all this, we go back with a decision.

…we split my group into our spotters and the rest, who go with the sat phone. His group with two guides heads off. We’re 45 minutes from camp, so we take enough gear (first aid, emergency shelter) to cope with everything fucking up and having to send a runner to call the chopper

…because at that point it’s more important that the main groups have comms (duty of care) than we do.

So up we go. The other guide stays at the base of the cliff, my small spotter team gets us back there. And I climb. It’s super easy, with a couple of sneaky moves

A lovely dihedral corner on superbly grippy dolerite, little ledges everywhere and a perfect set of cracks to stuff boots into. Very hard to fall out of, but also very intimidating for anyone who isn’t a climber. So I sail to the ledge where our stranded hiker is sitting

. At that position, I am wondering how the fuck she managed to not be injured, and counting lucky stars. So we sit for a while and breathe, small talk, discuss options and impacts. By now she’s tired, and also very relieved

…because she’s hiking solo, it was a real possibility to be stuck for a long time. Eventually we gear up for the down climb. Shes worried - but I guide her feet and hands to every hold, ones she could not see. I’m also a lot bigger than her so the basic plan is...

…if you slip I squash you into the corner. It’ll hurt but you won’t fall. But at any time, we bail back to the ledge and call for the chopper.

…and down we went. Turns out, after the exit from the ledge and two moves she becomes a mountain goat and skips down the rest.

…with me downclimbing just below and acting as the emergency landing pad. So we get to ground, head back to the main track and everyone is happy! By now its not far off dark - she’s completely happy to hike back to her car and head off.

We’ve done multiple checks for injury by now and she’s just done a 40m downclimb plus a bush bash back to the main trail so we’re also pretty convinced as guides that this is fine. My compadre-in-rescue offers to walk her back, but she refuses - which is OK.

As I said, she’s recovered fast and we have no reason to beleive that any further care is needed. So we go back to work - my little team of spotters gets to enjoy a sunset out near barn bluff, which never happens on a guided trip - and we all have tales to tell.

…and the other guide goes back to their camp.

The next morning I realised I’d left my full first aid kit in the bush up there, so I had a dawn mission to go find it.

...which I never did. Luckily I had my own independent stash, so we just ended up down a few bandages.

(the dawn mission was lovely by the way… it’s wonderful to go light and fast and watch a sunrise on the overland track)

Finally, we checked in next day with rangers (who have full time comms out there) for any hiking or road incidents, and there were none. So our mystery hiker also just carried on with whatever trip they were on. Life just happens huh?

The end!

oops, I forgot the mountain photo… this is the only easily accessible version I have… it’s the one in the background, we ended up someplace on the jumble of cliffs up there...

to really really finish, its never just ‘I did…’ in these situations, it’s always a team effort ;) So my awesome story is also a story of heaps of helpers willing to help! #CommunityIsKey