Incident Report #101 2009

In what must rate as one of the most ridiculous situations we have found ourselves on for quite some time, we found ourselves hunting down various members of a group who were incapable of organising themselves and taking responsibility for their actions. Initially a group of four were delayed when one of them had a minor fall, subsequently causing darkness to become a problem. One of them reported themselves on 'the path from the tarn to Chapel Stile'. Instinct warned us that this was probably not the case, and that they were probably on the Stickle Ghyll path; subsequently confirmed when one of the group made it to the New Dungeon Ghyll pub and phoned again. He was unable to decide if the 'injured' person was injured or if the problem was simply a lack of torches. Apparently unable or unwilling to borrow a torch and retrieve the party, the informant was erring on the side of the injury being a problem. Eventually we gave up and sent a small group to get them. However, when we got down the valley we discovered that, in a startling outbreak of self-reliance (shame it was too late) someone had borrowed a torch and set off to retrieve the party. You'd hope that would be the happy ending, but nothing could be that simple.....another member of the group decided he was going up to help as well. Unfortunately he contrived to miss the others, and continued up the hill; the others having made their way down. Another member of the party then set off to try and catch the other. We finally managed to catch them both up and point them back in the direction of the valley. All along, the group were insisting that they were 'experienced' walkers and knew what they were doing. We would disagree strongly that this was the case!