Stuck on a ledge, my life was at risk. I was to blame

Mary Cody was stranded on the Reeks without essential supplies. She survived thanks to the local mountain rescue team.

IT was a summer’s day, with blue skies over Carrantuohill. It was a day I learned valuable lessons the hard way.

Despite having hiked in difficult mountain ranges before, from the Andes to the Atlas to the Alps, inexperience and a lack of planning put my life and a friend’s life in danger. And it’s thanks to Kerry Mountain Rescue that I am able to write this today.

I ignored simple advice. I didn’t have a change of clothes or supplies of food or a mobile (my companion had a phone) and when I got lost I misguidedly believed that because I could see the bottom of the mountain, I could get there safely.

After getting lost, I was nervous and frightened but I continued, never thinking that I would end up trapped on a cliff ledge.

The day had started perfectly as my hiking companion, Julie O’Connor, and I parked in Cronin’s farmyard, the starting point for most walkers and climbers. With a path up and down Carrantuohill, it is possible to reach Ireland’s highest peak without specialist climbing equipment.

Julie had been up the mountain before and we are both fit. Setting out at 1pm, we were in good spirits. We walked into the foot of the Devil’s Ladder, a popular route up the mountain. After an hour, we made it to the top and to our right was the summit.

I have never been a fan of heights, and, having witnessed a woman tumble down the Ladder and cut open her head on our ascent (the Mountain Rescue Team were called out twice that day), we went down a different way.

The majority of hikers were descending by the ‘zig zag route,’ which involved coming down off Carrantuohill, going up another mountain and walking across a series of peaks. But we met two climbers who assured us that we could go straight down the route known as Heavenly Gates. (We had, instead, been directed down Brother O’Shea’s Gully, our rescuers later told us.)

Julie led the way down the gully, as she is more nimble and has no fear of heights. I was taking it easy, noting the advice that accidents often happen on the way down a mountain.

There was no one on this route and evening was starting to creep in. Neither of us remembers where we lost the path. We had been walking for five or six hours and our supplies of a banana, apple and cereal bar were long gone and we hadn’t seen a human in hours.

Once the sun started to disappear, there was a chilly feel in the air. In the distance, we saw a group of hikers who were on the right path and we decided to make our way to where they were.

Half an hour and several rocks later, we arrived on the ledge on which we were to remain stuck for two hours. The group we had spotted in the distance was long out of sight.

We hadn’t realised that we had scaled down a cliff face and that to attempt to get back up would have been highly dangerous. Beneath us was a sheer drop of 40 metres, of which we were unaware, as we were unable to see it.

I never expected to make a 999 call to be rescued from a cliff ledge and initially felt that it would be wasting their time.

But the truth is, we were trapped.

When we did make the call on Julie’s mobile, within minutes the rescue team contacted us (there was only a tiny patch of signal) and said they would be with us within the hour.

The sheer terror I had experienced when I first realised we were stuck on the ledge started to dissipate and we tried to remain calm as we waited.

Shortly before 9pm I saw the mountain rescue Jeep approach the base of the mountain. Then another and another, until a group of 15 rescuers were gathered a 20-minute walk away from us, assessing the situation.

They immediately called us and established that we were uninjured.

Then, slowly, they made their way up the mountain in groups of three and four. When they arrived at the side of the ledge, they engaged in banter (Cork and Kerry were playing in the Munster football final the following day) as two rescuers, using ropes, climbed down the rock face to the ledge.

The relief and gratitude were immense as they attached us both to a two-person harness and abseiled us down.

Many thoughts had run through my head while on the ledge: disbelief and anger that I had placed my life in danger, followed by the realisation they life really is a fragile gift, to be cherished and respected.

Back in the Jeep and with us wrapped in blankets, the rescuers commended us for making the call.

“People have died from falls much lower than that. We have had quite a few similar rescues in that area of the mountain where people get stuck on a ledge. You did the right thing and we would advise anyone who finds themselves in the same position to do the same thing,” said Damien Courtney of Kerry Mountain Rescue.

The men and women who volunteer place themselves in danger to save people at a moment’s notice. I can never thank them enough for the amazing work that they do.

* For more information or to make a donation, see www.kerrymountainrescue.ie.