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Climber escapes avalanche
Mar 22, 2010
TEESDALE mountaineer Alan Hinkes said ‘quick thinking and a bit of luck’ helped him cheat death and escape an avalanche that struck while he was walking in the Lake
District.
Mr Hinkes, the first Briton to have climbed all the world’s highest mountain peaks, explained how a snow slope gave way just as he was ending a solo climb at Great End in Borrowdale last Wednesday.
He said: “I’d just walked away from the edge. Luckily I was about 30 metres away from it when a wind slab just released on me.
“A piece about the size of a house roof broke off but I managed to get myself to one side. If I hadn’t, I would have fallen three or four hundred metres to my death. I thought ‘blimey, that was a close shave’.
“It was a combination of a bit of luck and quick reaction that saved me. If the avalanche had happened a couple of seconds earlier things might not have turned out so well.”
Mr Hinkes said he was aware the 2,986ft mountain was avalanche-prone and during the climb he had to use equipment to tackle the ice still clinging to the north side of Great End.
He said: “You have to be very wary of snow slopes – never underestimate them because, often enough,
it’s the easy-angled slopes that
avalanche.”
After hearing the roar of the falling ice and snow, two fellow climbers, who had passed Mr Hinkes on the way up, alerted the mountain rescue team, thinking the he had been swept away.
He said: “The two lads had seen me earlier and when they realised what had happened, they thought I was in the slab that had broken off and rang 999.”
RAF helicopters, an air ambulance, dog handlers and mountain rescue teams from Keswick, Cockermouth and Wasdale arrived on the scene just as Mr Hinkes reached the men who had raised the alarm.
The legendary mountaineer said: “They recognised who I was and said they thought I had been caught up in the avalanche. They said they would have to set up a Facebook page saying they had saved Alan Hinkes.
“The lads did the right thing – time is of the essence in situations like this. And the rescue teams were great. Some of them had been on
avalanche practice the previous weekend and they said this was good training. So thankfully, all’s well that ends well.”