'Easy' mountain walks safety row

A LEADING adventure magazine was yesterday accused of putting the lives of inexperienced hillwalkers in danger after claiming two of Scotland’s most challenging mountain routes could be safely traversed in the depths of winter without the aid of ice-axes and crampons.

The latest edition of Trail, the biggest selling magazine for hillwalkers in Britain, claims the 28 mile trek through the Lairig Ghru, in the heart of the Cairngorms, and Stac Pollaidh, an arduous, 13-mile mountain path in Wester Ross, could be free of deep snow "even in the worst winter weather".

Mountain rescue leaders and safety experts condemned the magazine, branding the article as irresponsible and potentially dangerous. The criticism was led by Richard Wild, the mountain safety adviser to the Mountaineering Council of Scotland, who claimed the article could mislead inexperienced hillwalkers and put them at serious risk.

He said: "In terms of promoting winter mountain safety and encouraging safe practice in the hills, the article could hardly be worse.

"The council would fully support the idea of suggesting alternative routes for people to do in winter which aren’t serious winter undertakings and which don’t become potentially dangerous when they are covered in snow and ice.

"But the Lairig Ghru and Stac Pollaidh don’t fit into that category. They are both potentially very serious undertakings, even in summer."

Mr Wild said he was particularly angry that the mountain passes had been described in the magazine as "challenging winter routes without the faff of ice-axe and crampons".

He said: "This suggests that it is reasonable to expect that one can have a ‘challenging winter route’ without taking all the normal winter mountaineering equipment - ice-axe and crampons.

"The practice of going into the winter hills without axe and crampons has been the cause of countless accidents and fatalities over the years.

"All organisations which are concerned with mountain safety have expended huge amounts of effort and expense in educating hillgoers about the necessity of being properly equipped during the winter," he added.

It was also irresponsible to suggest that no deep snow would be encountered while trekking through the Lairig Ghru, said Mr Wild. He pointed out that one of the best known landmarks on the route was Clach nan Taillear - "The Tailors’ Stone", saying: "It is named after three tailors who died huddled against it in a winter storm.

"We can only hope that the Trail article doesn’t produce another such incident."

John Allen, the leader of the Cairngorm mountain rescue team, also condemned the Trail article as "absolute nonsense" and "completely irresponsible."

Mr Allen told The Scotsman:

There can be snow in the Lairig Ghru all year round and we frequently have to rescue people who tried to find their way into the Lairig Ghru and got lost. It’s no soft touch."

However Guy Procter, the editor of Trail, defended the article. His magazine was for experienced climbers and hillwalkers and not "Sunday- afternoon strollers", he claimed

"Our intention in this feature was to highlight routes which this month our readers would find satisfactorily challenging but where the use of crampons and ice-axe was not the sine qua non," he said.

"It has been read as claiming the Lairig Ghru remains snow-free all year - a patently ludicrous notion - and it is my fault that sufficient ambiguity remains within the piece to allow for such an erroneous impression to be gained.

"Trail always takes safety seriously. I will be running a clarification in the following issue."

Walk for health: National campaign plan

THE Executive yesterday unveiled its latest low-tech weapon in the war against ill health - a national walking campaign.

Tom McCabe, the deputy health minister, announced the scheme after warning of the alarming levels of inactivity among Scots.

Speaking during a debate in the Scottish Parliament he said: "It is frightening that less than a third of adults and less than half of children achieve the minimum level of activity - 30 minutes and one hour per day respectively - to benefit their health.

"Scotland is one of the first countries to have a national physical activity strategy.

"It sets out our targets for increasing overall levels of activity by 1 per cent over the next 20 years, and after only nine months we are making excellent progress."

The Tory health spokesman, David Davidson, called for more sports in schools and better co-ordination between Executive departments to improve its policies on health.

He added: "Youngsters are brought up in homes in Scotland with many bad habits, shared no doubt by many people in this chamber, but The one habit we must all learn at an early age is exercise."

JOHN INNES