Climbers survived on soggy malt loaf

The two women climbers who survived for two days and nights in a snow hole on the north face of Ben Nevis after they became stranded in blizzard conditions left hospital yesterday.

Kim Roden, 22, from Warwickshire, and Zoe Green, 20, from Sheffield, who were found by mountain rescue teams on Saturday, were said to be "in good shape" after receiving treatment for hypothermia, frostbite and exhaustion at Belford Hospital in Fort William.

The pair, part of a 15-strong group of climbers from the University of Central Lancashire, described their ordeal on Britain's highest mountain as "horrific". They owed their lives, they said, to soggy malt loaf, glucose tablets and good mountain training.

The two students became stranded on an ice face 300ft below the 4,408ft summit late on Thursday. As night fell, they dug a snow hole in a nearby ledge to shelter from gale-force winds and driving sleet and snow. When they failed to return to the Glen Nevis hostel where their companions, who had taken alternative routes to the summit, were waiting for them, members of Lochaber mountain rescue service began searching the slopes. Late on Saturday, rescuers heard their muffled cries for help and broke into the snow hole.

"We started to climb Raeburn's Easy Route on Thursday but we took too long," they said yesterday. "It began to get dark and the clouds came in and we just couldn't see where to go next. We knew what the survival procedures were.We dug a snow hole and gotinside our bivouac bags."

With no sign of rescue teams and little change in the weather the following day, the two women realised they would have to spend another night on the mountain face. "Friday was horrible - very, very frightening," they said. "We had some malt loaf and glucose tablets and we knew we'd live another night but we didn't know what was going to happen beyond that. It was avalanching snow . . . and loose debris from the slopes above. We kept our arms around each other to keep warm."

Rescuers praised the women's "textbook emergency response".