Diary

Mon 5th September

After having August off training, it's like the first day of the new school year, with everyone turning up for casualty care training, aka first aid. In our mantra of SAFE approach, ABCDE, we're at D for disability. Steve goes straight into teacher mode and starts drawing bits of brain and spine on the blackboard, at least that's what he said they were - it's not exactly Rolf Harris standard.
We spend about 45 minutes going through the physiology of brain and spinal injuries, signs and symptoms, treatment etc. and then split into groups to try out some techniques related to these kind of injuries. This means that we try out the KED - effectively a stiff body jacket that we wrap around the head and torso of the casualty to immobilise the spine, whilst we extract them from an awkward location. We then move on to do some log-rolls - using a team of people to roll a casualty with a spinal injury, keeping the spine straight at all times.
I volunteer to be the casualty at the next station and am lifted into the vaccuum mattress. Initially, I feel some spine movement, but after a couple of goes, the group have perfected the technique and I'm perfectly stable all through the transfer to the vac mat. Once in, the air is pumped out of the mattress and I'm left completely immobilised. Lying in the mattress with a protective foam block against each year, Pete decides that now would be a good time to talk to me. He's drawn to the dodgy conclusion that I've a spinal injury and deafness.
Finally, we go through the operation of the new lightweight oxygen cylinders with Mick, covering the masks, flow rates and the nebulisers, for administering salbutamol to victims of asthma attacks.
We retire to the pub, where I try to maintain a low profile, having, by an unfortunate set of circumstances, incurred the rath of the Team Leader. It seems that my report last month of 'nothing much happened in Yosemite' was somewhat inaccurate and that Geoff spent much of his three weeks fighting off a series of grizzlies with his bare(!) hands - very wild west, I'm sure. Somewhat more seriously, I did omit to mention Geoff's 25 year service award and the presentation of not one but two certificates. Well done.
With immaculate timing, Landrover Monthly magazine published their article about landrovers in mountain rescue. As I'm not a subscriber, I haven't seen the article yet, but it's been pointed out by 'Irate of Hayfield' that I have more mentions in the article than the team leader. Once again, it seems that the continued appearance of the diary is hanging by a thread, whilst the author skates on thin ice!
My cunning 'low profile' plan fails, and I end up sitting next to Geoff in the pub - it turns out that I am indeed on my final warning!
To be continued .... (possibly)

Wednesday 14th September

Tonight we go through water hazard awareness training. This is a new topic for the team. Various Mountain Rescue teams have been involved in search and rescue around water. For example, KMRT recovered a body from the river in New Mills a couple of years ago and members of the Lake District teams helped in the floods in Carlisle last winter.
We've now got procedures and equipment to operate in this kind of scenario in a more effective and safe way. Geoff goes through the everything in a presentation and we see the new kit, including buoyancy aids, search poles and floating ropes. There's plenty of discussion about the whole thing. We'll put everything into practice on Sunday when training is at one of the reservoirs in the Longdendale valley. According to Geoff, no-one will get wet on the day, but I cann't really believe that!

Sunday 25th September

We're off to the Logdendale reservoirs to put our water hazard awareness training into practice. The training team are extremely disappointed to find that United Utilities have done a bit of reservoir management, moving water from 'our' reservoir to the one downstream. This means that instead of a sporty, steep slope down to deep water, we're left with an amble across the mud to shallow water. It's more like Blackpool beach than white water rafting territory.
Geoff recaps the main points from Wednesday's training and then we're into the practical. We split into three groups and my group goes onto the road to practise throwing the 15m throw lines. There's mixed results - some perfect throws, some needing disentangling from the adjacent trees. Thankfully, we manage to miss the horse sh*t in the middle of the road.
Filled with confidence, we march of to try it on the real thing. This is the 'before' photo, when we think that we know what we're doing:
Rescue party with throw ropes

As you can see, the hapless casualty (lets just call him Wet Mike) is flapping around in deep, fast flowing water. He's waiting for the rescue team to throw the line directly to him. He'll grab it and be hauled in to shore. These exercises are learning experiences and here we learned that throwing a wet rope is significantly more tricky than throwing a dry one, that the cross-wind is a major problem and that the gulls need to duck when Nigel's throwing. Eventually, Wet Mike decides he's had enough, stands up, the water reaching just below his knees, and wades in to shore. He's demonstrating that self-rescue is faster than waiting for KMRT to pull off a straight throw. Still, we provide so much entertainment that one group of walkers decided that it would be amusing to have their lunch and watch our progress. Sadly, they finished their lunch before we progressed!
We move on to the final activity, which is 'Preach and Reach'. The aim is for us to rescue the casualty without getting our feet wet - sounds like a great approach. We go through a couple of role plays, trying to attract the attention of a casualty, first by movement alone and then by voice alone. We then go through reaching for a casualty near the shoreline using the 4m search poles and dragging them in.
It's been a great day learning new techniques, marred only by Wet Mike's near death experience with the lesser know Peak District crocodile:
Mike and the inflatable crocodile

I'm a bit worried by the big grin on Mike's face - he shouldn't be having that much fun with an inflatable toy!
An early finish and we retire to the pub for a Sunday afternnoon drink. We're so confident about our water rescue capability that we sit outside, even when it starts hammering it down. We are Mountain Rescue after all.

Friday 30th September

We're at the Hayfield Conservative Club for the team meeting tonight. This is not a political allegiance, but the attraction of a large function room and cheap beer. We're having a team meeting and social event, so we need the space.
We get through the business of the meeting promptly. The main items of note is that we've bought some additional radios, so we should be in the position of having one each once they arrive. Of concern is the message from Geoff that the defib assessments are now due. Fortunately, there's time for some revision before the test in a couple of weeks. The final item is under Any Other Business, where Janet passes on thanks from the May Queen committee to the men of the team for our help on a couple of events last year. I'm not sure why the women of the team weren't mentioned in dispatches - they were probably just making cups of tea and providing management direction!
Moving swiftly on.... We start the social part of the evening, which could be described as members' holiday photos. An impressive set of destinations covering Iceland (Steve), Tatra Mountains in Poland (Steve again- see what owning a travel company does for your holiday destinations), Corsica GR20 (the SAGA group - Nigel (how come I'm the oldest and still working?), Chris, Dave, Pete and Pete (I am 15 years younger than the rest of them, honest), Yosemite National Park (Geoff and Chrissie) and the trump card played by Bob - the ascent of Mount Vincent in Antartica. The rest of the team were too bashful to show their photos, perhaps fearing that their superman reputation might be damaged by some snaps from Butlins.
The shows split between the old school 35mm slides (these will be around long after powerpoint's bitten the dust ....) to the all singing, all dancing laptop presentations. Sadly, those SAGA boys failed to get to grips with the technology and presented a no singing, slightly shuffling show, as the sound element of their lovingly prepared presentaion failed on the night. On the bright side, this did save the rest of us from listening to a soundtrack of traditional Corsican music - perhaps a lucky escape.
Anyway, a good time had by all - role on K Lee in 2 weeks time.