Today nineteen Team Call Out list members assembled at our Ladybridge Hall Base / HQ at 10.30hrs for a briefing before departing for our annual presence at the Good Friday festivities centred upon the West Pennine Moors landmark of Rivington Pike.
Every Good Friday a fairground is set up just for the day on Georges Lane immediately at the foot of Rivington Pike. This fairground, combined with the local traditions of Chorley, Horwich, Bolton and surrounding towns of walking up the Pike to the summit, draws thousands of visitors to the Pike area and even more to the general Rivington area.
Four of our Land Rover Mountain Rescue Ambulances were on hand, initially located at the Pigeon Tower and ‘New Toilet Block’ entrances to the Terraced Gardens, and on the Horwich side of the Fairground site on the moorland track of Georges Lane, where our Incident Control Vehicle was also parked up.
Throughout the day, in a joint operation with a large Lancashire Constabulary Police Officer presence, and three Rangers from United Utilities, the team was on hand to deal with a number of public safety issues, related to the thousands of visitors present in the area.
Reports above detail our responses to three specific incidents – 41 / 42 / 43 – 2014. Alongside these incidents we also dealt with (in co-operation with the Police and Rangers present) numerous missing children enquires, all found very quickly fortunately, and a number of minor first aid requests.
Late afternoon, we also liaised with a joint Lancashire and Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Services response to a grass fire near to the Pigeon Tower, in the Terraced Gardens, which also involved Police Officers.
One of our crews on duty at the base of Rivington Pike, were initially shocked when a father approached them for help as his son had a broken head!
Thankfully it was very quickly established that it was a broken egg…. with the child upset his decorated Easter Egg had broken whilst being rolled down the slopes of the Pike!
A few plasters soon put Humpty Dumpty back together again, with one happy child and one happy dad the result.
Many thanks to the awesome @BoltonMRT for patching up the boys egg! he won our egg race then dropped it on the path! pic.twitter.com/zSfTvu34xx
— Jenn G (@poppet_girl) April 18, 2014
Many visitors commented with thanks to us for our work in the local community and for being present today, “Just in case.”
As ever we met many friends up for a stroll to the Pike in the excellent sunny and quite warm weather that greeted all today, including former Team members and fantastic supporters and friends of the team, Dave Dorgan (a former Deputy Team Leader) and his wife Tricia Dorgan.
Besides the Team Call Out list members ‘officially’ present today, Team Call Out list member Kris Kilshaw, his family, and Team Support Group member Laura Tunnicliffe enjoyed quite a picnic (by all accounts) on the Pike summit, with Support Group members Iain Clarkson and Gillian Gregory also out for a day’s walk to the Pike.
Our Team Leader Garry Rhodes MBE, who can recall Good Fridays in the area back to the late 1970s, and through the early 1980s when he was a Voluntary Patrol Ranger, and now with the team since the mid-1980s to date, thinks this was one of the busiest Good Fridays for visitors to the Rivington Pike area for a great many years.
The Team members present today finished back at our Ladybridge hall Base / HQ at 18.30hrs.
