DCRO Practice at Mouldridge Mine

I joined a group of Team Members to a practice at Mouldridge Mine. Karen was feeling under the weather and stayed at home for the day.

The scenario was that a group of children had been taken underground by with some adults and one child had been afterwards to be found missing. In the meantime one of the adults had returned underground to search for the missing child but hadn't yet returned and after a reasonable time, it had been decided to get help.

I arrived first at the parking area by a track next to the main road in the hamlet of Pikehall and was soon followed by Steve and then the DCRO vehicle with Mick and Pete.

Steve was walking backwards directing Pete and Mick forwards with the vehicle but hadn't noticed the low garden wall belonging to the house next tot the parking area, and much to the amusement of Mick and Pete, he stepped backwards and disappeared from view as he fell over the wall!

Unfortunately, the other side of the wall was some four feet lower onto a concrete path but luckily Steve was uninjured except for some grazing and bruising.

Jim and Rosie were stationed at the entrance to the mine with radios for communications. Initially we couldn't get in contact with the DCRO vehicle so Jim tried walking up the far side of the Dale to see if that improved things while I did the same thing on the near side (myself and Mick were the Leaders in charge with Claire controlling things at the vehicle).

Suddenly we heard broadcasts from the vehicle which was a s a result of the large external aerial being set up.

So Jim returned to his initial position be the entrance.

Mick and his team had been given the task of searching on area of the mine while myself and my team were allocated the remaining half. We had copies of a survey with a recommended route for led groups but we were required to search all other areas providing it was safe to do so.

My group soon located one “casualty” (played by Tim) at the bottom of a slope near the set of passages known as the Banana Slide. After a member with a Casualty Care Certificate had made an initial assessment of the casualty (possibly broken or dislocated knee plus a diabetic) two team members were tasked to return to the entrance (only a few minutes away: Mouldridge Mine is fairly small) to report the situation while I and the “Cas. Carer” remained with the casualty and attempted to keep him warm with a Bothy Bag.

The two who had reported the situation returned and suggested we complete our actions and join with Mick's group to assist with their search.

We soon contacted the other group and discovered that their “casualty” (Peter) had been found at the base of a “winze” internal shaft in the mine and had been treated and packaged in a stretcher. So, we assisted with moving the stretcher towards the large chamber just inside the mine entrance.

In the chamber we “released” Pete and then, as there was still some time left, Tim returned to his previous position to be the initial “casualty” and he was moved up the slope and then down the sloping passage to a level passage below while wearing a full-body harness.

Once Tim had been packed in the stretcher and again carried to the same chamber as before and that was the end of the exercise at around 14:00.