North Yorkshire Police received a call from an obviously distressed Three Peaks walker (f, 32) who said she was lost on Ingleborough. The sound quality was very poor, then the call dropped out altogether. Force Control Room personnel recorded that there had been an earlier call from the group she had been walking with, reporting that she ‘got left behind’. On being alerted, CRO controllers were unable to contact the walker, nor was there any response to a Phonefind message. Two members were tasked with beginning to walk the reverse of the Three Peaks route, while others were being organised to go to the Sulber and Moughton areas, as suggested by the mobile phone company’s location system. However, the first pair found that the missing walker had just succeeded in reaching Horton car park, so other team members were stood down.
It later transpired that the other members of the (informal?) sponsored walk group, having walked over Pen y ghent and Whernside, decided not to continue, which left just the one determined to complete the walk. Having given the others a time at which to alert the emergency services, the lone walker continued, but became lost, as she used her phone for navigation and communication before it died. When she arrived in Horton, she was met only by CRO members, as her supposed companions had gone home. She really had ‘got left behind’! In this difficult situation, the management of Horton’s Golden Lion very kindly offered to accommodate the stranded walker (free of charge), just as a relative arrived (from an adjacent county) to take her home.
Volunteer hours 12.