WEATHER CONDITIONS Mist, snow, gale-force winds
EQUIPMENT Stretcher, medical stores, morphia, Very pistols, radio
NUMBER OF CASUALTIES Two
NUMBER RESCUED ALIVE None

One turns to the next incident:

WEATHER Mist, gale-force winds, heavy snow
NUMBER OF CASUALTIES Five
NUMBER RESCUED ALIVE None

And the next:

WEATHER Mist, snow falling. Deep, soft snow (chest-deep in places)
NUMBER OF CASUALTIES Four
NUMBER RESCUED ALIVE Four

The repetition of the number jumps at you: the number rescued alive is the same as the original number of casualties. The location is the Cairngorms in winter. The evacuation of four casualties must have been an arduous business for everyone concerned, particularly in chest-deep snow. One reads on;
“Kinloss were alerted at 8.30 p.m. in Glen Nevis on December 31st, were on the road [New Year's Eve] by 9.30 p.m., and all the casualties had been evacuated by 6.30 am on the following morning“ - from Coire an t-Sneachda in the Cairngorms. What happened in the nine hours between Glen Nevis and Coire an t-Sneachda?

What had happened - on December 30th - was that four young men went from the new ski-road car park over Cairngorm to Loch Avon to spend the night at the Shelter Stone there. They left no word of their intentions with anyone. They were adequately clothed but carried no sleeping bags. All were inexperienced, only one having some slight knowledge of winter hill-walking.

When they reached the Shelter Stone they were all wet from the weather, and perhaps because of this they decided to return that night instead of making some attempt to dry themselves with their Primus stove. They had plenty of paraffin. They could have returned easily in the morning by way of the Saddle (2,707 feet) and Strath Nethy to Ryvoan and Glen More - a way which (but for the rise of three hundred feet to the Saddle) would have been downhill and in comparative shelter. Instead of this they tried to return that night - over the plateau of Cairngorm.
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