At the conclusion of the teams attendance at the Canon Slade School Cross Country Championship event, all members present then assembled at our Ladybridge Hall Base / HQ, as NWAS (Greater Manchester Area) had requested the team to go to immediate standby to possibly assist with a high call volume. (See Incidents 89 to 92)

At 16.43hrs whilst all were still at our Base / HQ via SARCALL, the team was contacted by Lancashire Constabulary to respond to an incident on Healey Nab, above Chorley, with the report of a ten year old child stuck and sinking! in mud.

This area is actually within the operational primary response area of our colleagues at Bowland Pennine MRT, but the Police Force Incident Manager having been told all the Bolton team were immediately available, requested of our Team Leader that we respond.

At the same time as this conversation was taking place, team member Steve Fletcher was also in direct contact with Bowland Pennine MRT, who confirmed our response but also called out their members living in the south of their area to respond.

In the event a major multi agency response was initiated, with twenty three Bolton MRT members responding in five team vehicles, a number of Bowland Pennine MRT members, NWAS (Lancashire) resources, Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service, NWAS HART (From Trafford Park, Manchester) and Lancashire Constabulary resources.

At 17.03hrs we were stood down with other responding emergency assets, as Police Officers on scene had managed to rescue the girl.

The following is reproduced from the Chorley Police station Facebook entry, which further reports on this incident;

“Just after 4:30pm last night, officers were called to Healey Nabb in Chorley after a child became stuck in mud up to her waist. Mountain Rescue were called and the Fire Brigade, but brave officers PC Matt Gillett and PC Martin Shaw made it to the area and managed to extract her from the mud, despite the conditions. The female was taken to hospital for a check up, but our officers carried on till the end of their shift, despite looking like this!! Well done Matt and Martin.”