Team paged by Police to help three 20 year old lads who said they were lost on the top of Scafell Pike in high winds and their tent was “holding up” in very strong winds. The team leader quizzed them for over an hour on their mobile to establish where they were and understand the clues they were giving as to location. Their descriptions of having seen a white cross made of stones put their route as Scafell and not Scafell Pike. They had done a lot of turning left and right and walking on snowy footprints without a clue what direction they were actually heading in. They had originally come up out of Eskdale on a three day camping expedition. After passing over Scafell it would appear that they may have got all the way down Shamrock / Red Gill area and then gone over to Lingmell. Other descriptions did not help the location however sufficient information was given to give reasonably safe direction for descent. They continued down the mountain with periodic checks by mobile phone. Eventually at 7:00 hrs they reported they were well down the mountain in a valley and no longer required the services of mountain rescue. Which valley they had descended into was not clear to the team leader but at least they had got down without the need for what would have been a very full call-out.
Incident started at 02:10 and ended at 07:00 making 4.8 hrs in total. There was 1 Wasdale team member involved and the incident occured at NY2075 0663 (altitude 940 m). Total rescuer hours: 4.8
