TWO moor walkers were rescued by the Tavistock section of the Dartmoor Search and Rescue Group on Tuesday morning after an extensive ten-hour search in atrocious weather conditions. A man and a woman from Bristol were planning to walk across the moor from Okehampton to Princetown. But they hit problems when the woman suffered a leg injury in the Black Ridge Brook area near Lydford around 3pm on Monday. A helicopter from Chivenor and members of Okehampton section of the Dartmoor Search and Rescue Group were alerted following a mobile phone call from the scene, but failed to locate the couple. Controller of the Tavistock rescue group, Bud Francis, said by 11pm the Okehampton members were exhausted and could not continue and a search by a police helicopter had also come to nothing. ?The helicopter could not work in the weather conditions and so we were called to take over the search,? he said. ?Because a lot of the brooks and streams were impassable by this point, the only access we could get to that area of the moor was behind the Dartmoor Inn at Lydford. ?We eventually found the couple just before 2am.? The woman was given first aid in an attempt to raise her temperature. Mr Francis said there was a risk of hypothermia as the walkers were extremely wet but fortunately they had a tent with them. The couple were airlifted to the North Devon District Hospital and the Tavistock rescue team were all located by 7am on Tuesday.
