'I just don't know if he would have survived' – Charity walker relives moment his brother was nearly blown off Groats bridge during storm
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A charity walker relived the "scary moment" when he helped save his brother from serious injury or worse during the recent Storm Arwen when walking through Caithness.
Chris Howard is walking almost 11,000 miles around Britain’s coastline having started his journey back in May 2020, following the UK’s first lockdown – the hardship of which actually inspired him.
“During that first lockdown I was lucky enough to spend every day with my three daughters,” says Chris. ”We have a happy, healthy, normal(ish) home. Lots of children in the UK don’t have the same experience and I thought about that a lot.”
Children in Need seemed to be the right charity to raise money for and so he set himself the challenge of doing the coastal walk but was adamant he "must walk the entire distance" with no shortcuts.
"I'll use bridges or in roads where crossing points dictate, I'll navigate by OS map, GPS and the stars. I’m heading clockwise from North Norfolk so really I just have to keep the sea on my left.
"This is a challenge that will test me both physically and mentally. Long periods of walking alone in all weathers, I’ll walk for as long as I can each day. I will mainly sleep outdoors in a sleeping bag and bivvy. I hope to be offered a bed, sofa or shed occasionally but otherwise I’m surviving day to day on what I can carry."
Last week, Chris shared a post on his blog about how he was joined by his brother Tom and brother-in-law called Jim on the leg of the journey leading to John O'Groats from Dunnet where they had camped the night before.
A pleasant walk along the Caithness coast turned into a nightmare when the small team encountered a full-on blast of ferocious wind and hail from Storm Arwen – Chris describing it as "clearly not a normal weather pocket" and said they had to walk at an angle at a top speed of only a quarter-of-a-mile an hour.
"It was no longer safe and I knew I could keep going but I was not about to be responsible for anything bad happening to the other two. After a while Tom voiced his concern and said we should stop and take shelter by a wall but I knew if we stopped we’d freeze."
They stopped at a bridge close to the old mill being refurbished near John O'Groats and that's when the trouble really started as the storm whipped around them. "The bridge has got a low wall. My brother is much taller than me, which kind of acts like a great big sail [in the wind], and I could just see him going straight over the wall," Chris told the paper.
"As he went over I was close enough to get my hands on him to pull him back into the road. He would have gone straight into the river which was fast flowing and in full spate. Falling about 15ft into that and with his backpack on, I just don't know if he would have survived."
The hail was stinging their faces and blinding them but Chris said that "stopping was futile and more dangerous" so they kept on going to John O'Groats where a bus luckily just appeared. "I thought I can't keep these guys out in this. We all got on the bus, my brother freezing and shaking, and headed back to Thurso where we booked a room for that night."
The other two travelled back to their respective homes after their stay in Thurso and Chris journeyed on to Wick where we caught up with him at Mackays Hotel
"I'm very, very grateful to the people at Mackays Hotel here who put me up for free and fed me too. Now that I'm around the northwest coast I think things should go pretty quick now. I've come across from Cape Wrath in just under a week so that's pretty good going."
Chris headed off on his journey and thanks to the John O'Groats Trail walking route has made good progress, saying yesterday afternoon (Friday, December 10) that he was approaching Inverness.
Chris has a Facebook page and a website which is at: thecoastwalker.com/ where you can donate him a coffee or more.
His fundraiser appeal is also at www.justgiving.com/fundraising/thecoastwalker and has reached 72 per cent of the target amount with nearly £30K raised for Children in Need.
