RCN representatives take part in Mount Edith Cavell challenge

A team from the RCN and the RCN Foundation have completed a gruelling challenge to climb Mount Edith Cavell in Canada.

The team of four - RCN congress chair Stuart McKenzie, RCN deputy president Rod Thomson, RCN council member for the eastern region Carol Evans and RCN Foundation grants officer Lewis Allett - climbed the 3,363 metre mountain, which is named after nurse Edith Cavell, this week.

They were raising funds for the RCN Foundation and the Cavell Nurses Trust. 

Mr McKenzie and Mr Allett reached the summit of the mountain, which Mr McKenzie confirmed with a tweet yesterday afternoon. The climb took 17 hours. Mr Allett said the experience had been ‘awe inspiring’.

He added: ‘It was the most physical, mentally taxing and terrifying experience of my life. 

‘I have some minor aches and pains but a sense of major achievement.’

Ms Cavell was executed by the Germans during the first world war after helping allied soldiers escape from occupied Belgium.

Seventy people took part in the Mount Cavell Challenge to mark the centenary of the nurse’s death. The RCN and RCN Foundation team is aiming to raise £16,000 and has raised more than £9,000 so far.

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