A CLIMBER is recovering in hospital after a 40ft fall at a popular mountaineering haunt in Lancashire.

Mountain rescue experts were called in after the 50-year-old man, who has not been named, plunged to the floor of Lester Mill Quarry at Angelzarke.

Fellow climbers are believed to have alerted the emergency services after the fall, at around 6.20pm on Monday.

He had suffered a back injury and ambulance crews required the assistance of the Bowland Pennine Mountain Rescue Team to safely transfer him to a waiting ambulance.

Team leader Andy Birstead, from the Dunsop Bridge-based outfit, said: “He was found unconscious at the bottom after falling approximately 40 feet.

“It was reported to the ambulance service who alerted us and we sent down three vehicles and around 20 volunteers to assist.”

Paramedics and mountain rescue volunteeers worked to stabilise the casualty, using a specialist stretcher and full body vacuum splint, and transport him to a nearby ambulance.

Mr Birstead said that the volunteers were “stood down” at around 7.50 last night.

A Northwest Ambulance Services spokesman said the victim was taken to Chorley Hospital for assessment on a back injury.

The quarry is part of the Anglezarke Quarry complex, which attracts climbing enthusiasts from across the north-west and has been used as a training ground by British climbing legend, Sir Chris Bonington.