23 July '04

The John Muir Trust, owner of the summit of Ben Nevis, is alerting the public of the forthcoming removal of an artificial shelter from the neighbouring summit Carn Dearg. The Carn Dearg shelter, located approximately one mile to the northwest of the main summit of Ben Nevis (Grid reference: NN 158718, Ordnance Survey map 41) will be removed in the next few weeks.

NOTE: The Ben Nevis summit shelter, situated on the ruined weather observatory, will remain in place and there are no plans for its removal.

As part of the overall process of managing the Ben Nevis area, the decision to remove the Carn Dearg shelter was reached following careful consideration of all the safety issues by the Nevis Partnership. The Partnership’s ‘Mountain Management Group’, (comprising representatives from the Northern Constabulary, Highland Council Ranger Service, Lochaber Mountain Rescue Team, Lochaber Mountain Access Group, Mountaineering Council of Scotland and the John Muir Trust) unanimously agreed that the Carn Dearg shelter should be removed.

The main reasons for its removal are that the shelter is often buried in snow in winter and is frequently difficult to locate and enter; valuable time and energy may be spent looking for it in circumstances where it would be better to descend to safety. There are no recorded mountain rescues or incidents involving the shelter in the last ten years and the shelter is not a crucial navigational marker.

On Ordnance Survey maps the Carn Dearg shelter is marked simply as "Shelter". On the commonly used Harvey map of Ben Nevis the shelter is marked on the summit detail section as "Refuge (often hidden under snow)".

Permission by Harvey Maps

George Bruce, a previous member of the Lochaber Mountain Rescue Team for 37 years and current Treasurer of the Lochaber Mountaineering club said: “With today’s improvements in mountaineering clothing, incidents of hypothermia have been greatly reduced. The shelters have more or less outlived their usefulness.”

For further debate on what markers and shelters should be kept on Ben Nevis, click here.

The summit area is owned by The John Muir Trust. Their thoughts on tidying up the mountain can be read here.