The heroes who beat the Beast from the East
AFTER the snow came the sun which shone a light on all the heartwarming stories of remote communities which huddled together to survive the Beast from the East.
As the great thaw took hold in the Scottish Borders the snow literally melted before your eyes sending fine mists rising from snowy fields and embankments.
Borders towns were engulfed in a thick haar pouring from the River Tweed, and when the sun finally heated the ground they emerged like Brigadoon after a long spell in isolation to tell their tales.
Children organised supply runs on sleds to the local shops, a pizza parlour baked more than 100 loaves of bread, carers walked for miles through remote villages and valleys, mountain rescue teams worked tirelessly for days, community leaders hunkered down in an old nuclear bunker to co-ordinate the emergency response, and hundreds of local people mucked in clearing roads and caring for neighbours and friends until the snow cleared.
Steve Penny, 58, team member at Tweed Valley Mountain Rescue, said: “We had 27 team members out during the emergency.
“The most serious event our teams dealt with was the couple trapped in their house by a massive snow drift in West Linton, but there were incidents going on all over. At that time, I was dealing with a young girl who had a potential back injury in the Selkirk hills.
“We had one call from a woman who said her partner was lost in a snowdrift somewhere on the A68 but she didn’t know where and was panicking. We have an application called SARLOC, which allows us to send a text message to the missing person, as long as they have a phone and data signal, which immediately shows exactly where they are. We got our plough up to the summit of the Cheviot Hills, at Carter Bar, and shook hands with our Northumbrian colleagues to confirm that the A68 was clear all the way to England.”
Paul Cathrow, a mountain rescue volunteer, said: “I’ve never seen conditions like it. There are people who have worked for mountain rescue for 25 years who have never seen snow so deep.”
Rescue teams were forced to improvise as equipment was stretched, and in one case a snow drift was transformed from a treacherous obstacle to a lifesaving cushion.
Lynne Crombie, operations director at social care provide SB Cares, said: “We have a Fiat Panda 4x4 which helps at this time of year, but we knew it would be able to go everywhere in those conditions.
“The team in Peebles that support the clients in West Linton decided to make an attempt because they were determined to reach their clients. They got within three miles of West Linton in really bad conditions and came across a three-foot deep snow drift and got stuck.
“A tractor was sent out but it didn’t have towing equipment, so to get them out they banked up a load of snow behind the vehicle, pushed the snow which then pushed the vehicle to get them back out to the road and on to their job in West Linton, and went out the next day to do it all again when the conditions were a bit better.
“The communication between us, mountain rescue and the carers meant that we had two carers and two mountain rescue guys transporting an elderly lady from her home in Hawick to a care home.
“We had a transportation issue for the lady whose main carer had died, something that would not normally pose a challenge but at time the conditions were at their absolute worst.
“It was a great team effort, and that was a theme throughout the period. One of the carers volunteered to stay out and buy bread and milk for clients, even though she wasn’t working, and there are numerous stories of that happening.
“One carer actually stayed at a care home for four nights, and we provided accommodation for Borders General Hospital staff at nearby care homes because they were struggling to get out.
“There were no staff illnesses and everyone worked morning and night to check on people. We do around 2,000 visits a day and there were no major issues, which is pretty remarkable.”
It was a great team effort, and that was a theme throughout the period