Rescued caver plans return

Rescuers free Laura Trowbridge from the cave complex

A potholer who was trapped underground for almost 24 hours after an accident is keen to return to the cave as soon as possible.

Laura Trowbridge, 22, sparked a "superhuman" rescue effort when she fell from a ledge inside Otter Hole cave in Chepstow, south Wales.

"It hasn't put me off caving at all and I want to get back into Otter Hole as soon as I can," she said.

She was filming for a TV documentary when the accident happened.

A team of 100 rescuers worked in difficult conditions in the cave complex, which becomes partially flooded by a river for 12 hours each day.

Ms Trowbridge - who is still recovering at Nevill Hall Hospital, Abergavenny - was stuck underground for almost a day before emerging to be taken by lifeboat and then helicopter to hospital.

But she was undeterred by her ordeal.

The rescue team were amazing Caver Laura Trowbridge

"I went there to see the best cave formations in the UK and help to film them and I still want to do that," said Ms Trowbridge, of Taunton, Somerset.

"We're already planning a return trip to complete the film once I'm better."

Monty Python

The Aberystwyth University student, an experienced caver, slipped on a 5ft climb near the end of the cave and injured her pelvis.

The other eight people with her launched a bid to rescue her.

One of the film crew was a cave rescue doctor, and six other members of the party - including two trained in first aid - were members of South Wales or Somerset cave rescue teams.

They made a makeshift stretcher out of a camera tripod, and kept her as warm and comfortable as possible.

The group spent the next 10 hours drinking hot soup, eating Mars bars and reciting sketches from the TV series Monty Python and Blackadder to keep up their spirits.

The first rescue team arrived from the surface 10 hours after the incident, which started on Tuesday afternoon.

Laura Trowbridge is lowered into a lifeboat on a stretcher

Ms Trowbridge was treated for her injuries and placed in a special flexible rescue stretcher.

"The rescue team were amazing," she said. "Few people realise that on a cave rescue the only people who go underground are ordinary cavers who volunteer their time, and that includes the four doctors who helped me.

"None of the professional rescue services was involved until I reached the surface."

The rescue effort became particularly difficult towards the end because of the narrow entrance to the cave, meaning Ms Trowbridge had to be taken off the stretcher and crawl along unaided.

"The last section of passage near the entrance was the hardest for me as because it is so small," she explained.

"There was little the team could do to help me in such a small space, but by then I knew I was very close to the surface."