BUDE Coastguard Rescue Team were paged at 6.40pm on Monday, July 15 and tasked to Compass Point in Bude by Falmouth Coastguard Operations Centre, following a 999 call reporting that a child was stuck on the cliffs directly in front of the Pepperpot.
As a potential cliff rescue operation, Boscastle Coastguard Rescue Team were also paged to provide personnel backup.
As the team began to muster at the station, further information was received that it was in fact two young boys who were stuck on the cliff, with one being in a very perilous position on a shale slope, and the other on the top ridgeline. With this new information, Falmouth CGOC scrambled Rescue 924, the Coastguard Rescue helicopter based in Newquay, while the Rescue Team’s made their way to the incident under blue lights.
Arriving on scene, and with Rescue 924 now scrambled, the officer in charge directed one of the rope rescue technicians to take up the position of ESO (Edge Safety Officer), setting up a holdfast and making his way to the cliff edge, to communicate with and keep watch on the two young males. An assessment of the situation by the OIC deemed that a cliff rescue was indeed too dangerous to perform, so the team prepared for the arrival of the helicopter, maintaining crowd control and keeping the public at a safe distance in advance of the arrival of the helicopter.
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As Rescue 924 appeared, Boscastle CRT also arrived on scene. As the helicopter crew decided on a rescue plan for the two young males, the two Coastguard Rescue Teams prepared a HLS (Helicopter Landing Site) for Rescue 924 for once it had completed the rescue.
Maintaining a steady hover above the casualties, Rescue 924 lowered down one of its Winchman Paramedics to the first casualty, in the most precarious position. Having successfully placed him in the rescue strop, he was winched aboard the helicopter, as it made a second approach for the second casualty. However, against all advice, but understandably scared, the second casualty picked his way across the ridge line to the cliff top, where the ESO hauled him onto the cliff as quickly but as carefully as possible.
With the second casualty now safe, Rescue 924 came in to land in the pre-prepared HLS, and the first casualty was returned to his clearly relieved parents. Once Rescue 924 had safely departed the HLS, all teams were stood down.