Welsh 1000m race : tales of Hypothermia, sharing bodily warmth with strangers and the best and worst of people

Sunday Jun 07, 2009

We all have a number of personalities, my 1st 3 are Dad, Sun techie and mountaineer. Mountaineering for me starts with walking in hills, and includes rock climbing, ice climbing, Alpine and greater ranges climbing, even deserts. Fell or Mountain running is just part of the mountaineering continuum and the bit which fits the rest of my life best in 2009. Since 1979 in the school outdoor pursuits club run by a physics teacher Mrs Convery(who gets a signifiant amount of credit for introducing myself and a few of my peers to the delights of mountains) I have walking, climbed and run in mountains in Wales, Lakes, Pennines, Scotland, European Alps, North America, Iceland, Norway and New Zealand. Risk is ever present, you can't ignore it as trouble is never far away. Small decisions like taking a thicker hat, changing your route, stop to eat or push on, deciding to continue or not have major effects on your long term plans.

In the last 18 months, I have really enjoyed entering a number of fell races and a few Ultra Marathons. Still mountaineering to me. The rules for mountain based fell races state the kit you need to carry and some races have kit checks. It is enough to keep you alive, but won't keep you warm and won't enable you to help someone else. Most state on the entry forms the need for navigational experience. 2 of the races I have done have been shortened due to bad weather and they have all been very well marshaled.

I took part in the Welsh 1000m race yesterday. Dog and I had great run over the 1st section of the race on the Carneddau the previous Sunday when it was very hot (lots of available water on the top to drink and sit in if you are a dog). 6 days later the forecast mentioned "unseasonably cold, 60mph winds", so I took an extra thermal, extra leg cover and a replaced my summer foreign legion style sun hat with a thinsulate hat. Indeed, I took more clothing with me than some of the races I have done in winter. I have been on the Carneddau in some quite bad weather in the past, they are a high and exposed range and navigation can be difficult.

At the start on the north Wales coast at 9.30 all the fell running class were sheltering from the rain under a huge beach tree at the edge of the field. If we had not been bused there from Llanberis over 10 miles away, if I am honest I would have gone home at that point. At the start we were told that if anyone was not happy with the conditions, they should not start. I was comfortable with the conditions, just knew it would not be a much fun.

I started slow as I try to do with long races, after about a mile I started passing people and overtook about 30 runners on the way up to ridge near Foel Grach. It stopped raining on the way up, so I was running in shorts. Just before getting to the "motorway" that runs along the top of the Carneddau, the wind really got up and it started raining again, so I put my hat, overtrousers and waterproof on. They are lightweight, but do a really good job of keeping the wind and rain out. On the way up Carneddau Llewelyn, the wind really got up, and rain turned to sleet or at least it stung when it hit your face so it felt like sleet. Still it was June, how bad can it be. Got to the top of Llewelyn and the checkpoint, got dibbed (Electronic device which records which checkpoint you have been to) and gave my number to the marshals and started the decent along a broad but rocky ridge to Carnedd Dafydd. Slow going as it was rocky and I was starting to get a bit cold. but was OK. Quite a few of people around, both runners and we had caught up some groups of walkers doing the 1000's who started over an hour earlier and also some walkers just out for the day. Something clicked in my head that this was either no fun and/or getting towards being too serious weather for the kit I had and trying to complete, let alone do a competitive time was more risk than I wanted to take on. I decided to run the next 200m along the ridge, then drop off the south side of the ridge on a 140 bearing to the stone wall and the extra checkpoint that had been put in this year and retire. Being that much lower the wind would have dropped. So at this point the race had finished for me anyway and the next 15 minutes would be about loosing height, finding the wall and letting the marshals know I had retired.

About 3 minutes after making the decision I came across a fellow runner sitting down among the rocks. Lets call her J. I asked her if she was OK. No response. I asked again, all I got back was "What time is it?". Hypothermia was the obvious cause. Lots of people like myself run the race on their own, so it was quite possible she was on her own. I got her up, took her hand and we started walking along the ridge, I managed to get her name out of here. I have been close to Hypothermia myself once when diving in Ireland in April about 8 years ago and been on various mountaineering and diving 1st aid courses, so I knew how serious it was, what to do and also that if she stopped walking (or being able to walk) without shelter she was in real trouble. We were both dressed to run. J. had no hat which was probably the tipping factor. Running or hard walking up hills generates a lot more heat than walking. Walking pace on flat ground avoiding rocks does not generate that much heat. This was an "O, ****" moment, on my own my chances of getting her down were very small if she stopped walking. I continued with my plan of walking along the ridge, finding some help and then dropping off on the south side. About 5 minutes after finding J., a friend [ lets call him R. ] of hers came back looking for her. We managed to get her another 20 meters, then she collapsed. At that point 2 walkers out for a nice day of wet and cold [ Lets call them Saint D. and Saint W. ] walked past with concern on their faces. R. asked for help. Out came their bothy bag (in the wind I heard the words body bag and thought to myself it was not quite that serious yet), R. and myself got either side of J. who was now on the way to unconscious. We did get an extra jacket on her and some energy gel into her before she became unresponsive.

I only heard the next bit as I was inside the shelter. 5 soldiers competing in the Military class from the Regiment of Wales turned up, 1 commanding officer (a Captain I was later told, but might have got that confused) and 4 18-20 year olds who had little mountain experience. 3 of the soldiers were in a state similar to that of J. They tried to get into their survival bags, but were unable to open them. The C.O. told them to get on with it and with 1 other troop left to carry on with the race. At this point Saint D. and Saint W. took over and sorted them out. One of the soldier complained of chest pains.

Saint W. to troop B. : how do you feel?
Troop B. to Saint W. : I have a pain in my chest
Saint W. to troop B. : Do you smoke?
Troop B. to Saint W. : yes
Saint W. to troop B. : Today is a good day to stop don't you think

This does raise the question of what the C.O. thought he was doing leaving 3 of his troops in the care of random(though proved to be far more capable) walkers and carrying on. R. it appears is a Captain in the British Army, different regiment but has submitted a formal complaint to the British Army's accident investigation unit, accompanied by statements from those involved in the rescue. The soldiers C.O. demonstrated behavior which shows the worst of human nature putting competitive aims before those in your charge or even random strangers.

Before the military wounded descended on us, our collective plan was to warm J. up to the point where she could walk with help and walk her off. J. was starting to respond, so this would have been a good plan. Now with 3 troops in bivy bags, there was no way 5 of us could carry/help 4 casualties off the mountain. The mountain rescue were called(mobile phones are great things) and took them about 45 minutes to get up to the ridge. As one of the troops had chest pains, the big yellow taxi in the sky option was considered, but to those of us on the ridge it was obvious that the wind and visibility meant that was out of the question. We were joined by 2 more walkers and 2 race marshals and then 2 members of the Ogwen Mountain Rescue team.

What the M.R.T. did that was extra to Saints D. & W. was very simple, extra very warm clothing for the 4 casualties, a big bothy shelter for 8 or so people which we all got into and took control. Once the 4 causalities had warmed up enough, they were walked off with support. As they walked they warmed up and after about 20 minutes they did not need support. Tea and soup at the mountain rescue hut and I got a lift back to Llanberis with Saint's D and W.

So, Clive what would you have done different? It is all very well from the warmth of Pete's eat, with a large tea, just having consumed sausage, egg, beans and chips to suggest that staying in bed would have been the best option. Part of the reason that you enter a fell race is that you go fast and light and if things go wrong, there are other runners and marshals, etc to help out as an last resort. Yesterday was a last resort type of day. The big thing that hit me was how helpless I was to help J. if it had just been me. My very minor contribution was finding her 2 friends and Saint's D. and W., and giving up some body heat, energy gel and a few jelly babies. The only thing I would have changed, apart from not starting myself, would have been to carry a bothy shelter. I had enough clothes and food to cope with the conditions myself, I knew the route and had the navigation skills, but was not in a position to help anyone else beyond helping/guiding/kicking them down the mountain (Hypothermia cases often just want to sit down, so being a bit of a bastard to keep them on their feet and going is the right thing to do).

The organizers made it clear the nature of the conditions on the mountain tops at the start and we could just walk away. Other than the Commanding Officer for the 3 troops who I trust will get dumped on from a great height next week for leaving those in his charge and taking them out underequiped in the 1st place, I don't find blame anywhere. Mountain walking/running is sport for grown ups who choose to take and then manage or walk away from risks. Maybe J. should have taken hat, one of those small decisions with potential big impact. Easy to be lulled into thinking it is only June, how cold can it get.

The mountaineering mutual insurance scheme worked well. Saints D. and W. provided support to those who needed it. The Ogwen Mountain rescue team funded by donation, staffed by volunteers who admit they actually really enjoy most of the MRT training and work, are the emergency service. The tax payer does pay for the big yellow Taxi (as the MRT call it), but talking to a RAF Sea King pilot a few years ago, he commented that they see mountain and cliff rescues as training and that if they called on for their day job such as aircraft down or ship in trouble, mountain based cases would come second.

The speed of onset of Hypothermia surprised me. I was told J. was running like a train with her 2 friends 5 minutes before I found her. A few minutes later they looked back and she was gone. J. had decided to sit down without telling them. Running speed to unconscious in less than 10 minutes.

BBC reporting looks to have been quite balanced.

Now, I must pay for the tea and soup at the Ogwen MRT hut.

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Posted at 11:01AM Jun 07, 2009 by clive in General
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