Credit Wasdale Mountain Team
A mountain rescue dog had to be saved by a mountain rescue team as she descended England’s highest peak.
Daisy – a 120 lbs St Bernard – was brought down from Scafell Pike.
It took 16 members of the Wasdale Mountain Team five hours to carry her to safety.
Daisy refused to budge from the summit and was showing signs of pain in her rear legs.
Cumbria Police alerted the Wasdale team.
A Wasdale member said:
“Having team members with their own pampered pooches at home, and also our very own much-adored search dog Jess, we recognise the distress that both an animal can feel and also that of their owners.
“Therefore … when Cumbria Police contacted us about a St Bernard dog, who had collapsed whilst descending from the summit of Scafell Pike and therefore unable to carry on, our members didn’t need to think twice about mobilising and deploying to help retrieve Daisy off England’s highest.”
The team spoke to a vet before starting the rescue and Daisy was given pain relief before being lifted on stretcher.
As spokesman said:
“After a little persuasion and a bit of arranging the stretcher to become dog-friendly, and of course plenty more treats, Daisy very quickly settled down with her chin resting on the head guard, having realised that we were trying to help her.
“From there on, apart from the odd little adjustment, the evacuation was found to be not that much different to a normal adult evacuation which, of course, is the bread and butter of our team, which we have done hundreds of times before.”
St Bernard dogs were bred to help with rescues in the Alps in Italy and Switzerland.
The Wasdale team said Daisy was the “perfect casualty” and is now recovering from her own rescue ordeal.
The spokesman added: “She apparently feels a bit guilty and slightly embarrassed about letting down the image of her cousins bouncing across the Alpine snows with barrels of brandy around their necks.”
Credit Wasdale Mountain Team
