BLUEMOMENT

According to figures issued last week there were 573 incidents on Scottish mountains last year. A total of 693 persons were assisted of whom 270 were injured and 52 people who died. 158 of these incidents were non-mountaineering. Sailing about in oor wee boats seems relatively safe by comparison after all.

Old Troll wrote:According to figures issued last week there were 573 incidents on Scottish mountains last year. A total of 693 persons were assisted of whom 270 were injured and 52 people who died. 158 of these incidents were non-mountaineering. Sailing about in oor wee boats seems relatively safe by comparison after all.

Perhaps they should ban drinking on the mountains?

lady_stormrider wrote:The problem the Mountain Rescue Teams in the Lake District are the idiots who download a map as an App & expect the emergency services to come out for them if they set off an hour before sunset wth no torch or coat.

Is that very different from yachtsmen who treat the RNLI as a free version of the RAC?

lady_stormrider wrote:The same people treat the RNLI as a free recovery service - and then complain if they aren't towed to where they wanted to get to as 'After all we ARE taxpayers'.

I was chatting to a retired coastguard recently who told me of a sailing yacht with failed engine which called in to demand a tow from Ardnamurchan to Tobermory. "It's a nice sailing day. Why can't you sail there?" he asked them. "We could" they replied "but we've got a table reserved for dinner at 7.30. Send the lifeboat, please."

He didn't.

lady_stormrider wrote:I would be interested in comparing Scottish Lifeboat rescue statistics against mountain rescue statistics. Not just raw figures but how many as a percentage were deemed non-urgent.

I wonder how many could have been deemed 'pan pan' instead?

It would also be interesting to know how many person-hours of leisure activity are covered by each. I wouldn't be surprised to find that an order of magnitude more time is spent on the hills than is spent at sea.