Whilst responding to the previous incident, LAS requested we attend another incident in the same area at the same time. They had received a report of a woman who had fallen and injuring herself, informing LAS she was near “the Castle in Rivington.” It was assumed that this referred to the ruins of Liverpool Castle replica in Lever Park, and within five minutes of receiving the call at circa 13.11, our Team Leader was on scene followed by other members, but could not locate the casualty site.

Other walkers in the vicinity of the Castle were questioned, to no avail, and the response quickly developed into a search to locate the injured woman.
Team members then relocated to the Great House Barn, to better co ordinate a search of the Lower Rivington Reservoir shore side path to the Castle, being joined by GMP Officers who had also responded to the same incident following calls made to GMP.

It was then established that the 999 caller, lacking local knowledge, had described Rivington Pike Tower as “the Castle” by mistake, and the focus of the rescue switched to the area below Rivington Pike.

The woman concerned, along with a companion was then quickly located by team members on Roynton Lane, near the mid point of Rivington Terraced Gardens, and was picked up in a team member’s four wheel drive vehicle and brought down to the LAS Ambulance RVP at Rivington Hall Barn, whence she was taken by the LAS Ambulance to Royal Bolton Hospital with suspected lower back injuries.

Team Vehicles, LAS Ambulances at the RVP.

Thus ended a double call out afternoon for the team, with this second call in particular relying heavily upon the expert local knowledge of the team (or more specifically in this case, our Team leader who has a very intimate local knowledge of this area gained over some 30 plus years experience of walking in the area).