Members of the RAF Leeming mountain rescue team stepped in on Saturday in to help a casualty near Howtown in the absence of the Patterdale team, who were away in Scotland’s Cairngorm mountains doing winter training.
The RAF team went into action following a report of a female who had been walking at Scalehow Wood when she suffered an ankle injury caused by a falling tree and was unable to continue.
With the RAF rescuers having agreed to cover the Patterdale area during that team’s four-day Scottish training trip, they attended the scene and carried out an assessment before evacuating the injured woman by stretcher off the hill.
She was then taken to hospital by her friends in their own car for further treatment.
The Wednesday before, the Patterdale team were called by police to help two walkers who had become lost descending from Helvellyn. They had found themselves unable to continue in the dark and rang for assistance.
Due to the Patterdale team being in the Cairngorms, the incident was passed on to the Penrith team.
As they were starting the rescue and gathering information, they were contacted by police to say the lost walkers had managed to find their own way down to Patterdale.
