Following on from Incident 110/2016, two team members, Team Leader Alistair Greenough and Equipment Officer – Communications, Steve Fletcher, had travelled to Royal Bolton Hospital to retrieve equipment used in the rescue. Alistair retrieved a message from two walkers who had become lost whilst walking up Winter Hill.

After getting initial information by talking to the lost walkers, a “SARLock” attempt was made which sends a message to the phone which, when activated, will return the location of the phone to our mapping systems. This was unsuccessful. Alistair and Steve contacted Greater Manchester Police and Lancashire Constabulary to ping the phones to discover which mast the phone was connected to.

A full team callout was made by our Deputy Leader Chris Greenhalgh, with 23 people responding to assist with this search. Additional assistance was requested from our neighbouring team Rossendale & Pendle Mountain Rescue Team, Search and Rescue Dogs from NSARDA and SARDA Wales and the Greater Manchester Fire & Rescue Service search dog and drone.

Team members were tasked to search paths on the Bolton side of Winter Hill.

At approximately 17:00 hours team member Dave Cook located the walkers on Coal Pit Lane safe and well, albeit cold and wet.

The two were taken to our Mountain Rescue base where they were provided with dry clothing, food and hot drinks.

In an emergency the correct procedure to mobilise Mountain Rescue is to call 999 and request Police or Ambulance. The police or ambulance control will mobilise Mountain Rescue as necessary.