Nine-year-old boy tells how he fell 160ft off mountain - and survived with just a bruise

A nine-year-old boy has told for the first time how he fell 160ft from Helvellyn in the Lake District - and survived unharmed.

The accident happened on February 13, when Marwaan Rajakazee was climbing down Swirral Edge ridge on Helvellyn, which at 3,117ft is England's third highest mountain. He slipped on ice and fell down the snow-covered mountain as his father, Imtiaz, watched in horror.

Marwaan told The Mirror: "I slipped and tumbled down the mountain before crashing into rocks.

"All I can remember is people putting me on a stretcher, tying me to something and lifting me up into the helicopter.

"I couldn't see anything because they put a thing on my neck that kept me in one position. I've only got bruises. I wasn't too scared."

Understandably, Imtiaz feared the worst and assumed his son was dead. But when he scrambled down the steep slope to reach him, Mirwaan announced: "I'm alive."

ITV reports that a doctor and paramedic were dropped on the ridge by air ambulance. They treated Marwaan for suspected head injuries before flying him to the Royal Infirmary in Newcastle.

The Mirror reports that he was released the next day with just minor bruises.

Imtiaz, from Preston, Lancashire, told The Mirror: "I thought I had lost him. I can't begin to describe the feeling.

"One minute he was next to me, the next he was gone.

"His body picked up speed. He disappeared through rocks and seemed to hit everything as he went.

"One minute he was in the air, the next he hit the ground. He was completely out of control. I can't believe he could survive something so terrifying. He was tumbling over jagged stone all the way down."

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