At 12.06hrs this very warm (28c) and sunny day, we were paged by NWAS (Manchester) EOC Parkway, regards a mountain biking accident in the vicinity of Rivington Pike.

The call was answered by our Team Leader Garry Rhodes MBE, with a fully detailed pager call out being made at 12.18hrs, by which time four drivers were already responding to our three team vehicle garage locations.A 48 years old experienced female mountain biker (and road cyclist) had sustained an ankle injury whilst cycling in the company of a group of male young and adult fellow mountain bikers.

Her colleagues, including amongst their midst a first aider had comforted her, whilst contacting 999 for the Ambulance Service.

Our first of four responding Land Rover Mountain Rescue Ambulance vehicles went mobile at 12.20hrs, with our first team member in Land Rover ‘Bolton Mobile 3’ arriving on scene at circa 12.32hrs.

Team member Steve Fletcher quickly made contact with the group, and guided in his colleagues to the woman’s accident site alongside the hillside Terraced Gardens at Rivington (Whether the group including the injured woman from Penwortham, Preston, were aware that this had formed part of the 2002 Commonwealth Games Mountain Bike Course we do not know)

Her injured left ankle was quickly splinted in a specialist vacuum splint, and at 13.03hrs a short mountain rescue stretcher evacuation commenced back to the waiting Team Land Rovers on the high moorland track of Georges Lane.

Stretcher carry to the waiting ambulance

Here she was met at 13.10hrs by the responding NWAS Emergency Ambulance crew (From Bolton South Ambulance Station) who further assessed her injury.

Placed in to our ‘Bolton Mobile 4’ Land Rover, alongside the NWAS crew, (Who had been transported along the rough track in our BM4 Land Rover) she was driven and then transferred to the waiting NWAS Emergency Ambulance at Wilderswood, Horwich, for onward journey to Royal Bolton Hospital.

In the interim, our Land Rover ‘Bolton Mobile 3’ transported the injured woman’s mountain bike down to Rivington Hall Barn, where she and her companions had set off from earlier this morning.

By 14.00hrs on scene all was completed.

In total ten team call out list members and one Probationary team member were involved on scene with this incident, our fifth mountain bike accident attended this year.