David Whalley died recently aged 72. He had spent almost 40 years with the Royal Air Force Rescue Service. He was a legend of mountain rescue having attended more than 1,000 incidents and 80 plane crashes. He was also a passionate mountaineer who climbed Scotland’s 282 Munros (mountains over 3000 feet) seven times and went on more than 30 RAF expeditions. David had saved many lives.

David was a son of the manse, the youngest of five children. His father was a minister of Newton Wallacetown Kirk in Ayr. David was four when he climbed his first mountain, Goat Fell on Arran. After local schooling he applied to join the RAF, but at 5ft 4in was turned down. He was finally accepted in 1972 and was immediately christened “Heavy”, a nickname that stuck. He once told friends that he would have ended up in jail had he not joined the military.

One tragic incident remained forever etched in his mind. On 21 December 1988, Pan Am flight 103 exploded over Lockerbie in Scotland with the loss of 270 lives. It was the deadliest terrorist attack the UK has ever seen. At the time David was team leader of the RAF Leuchars Mountain Rescue Team and said, “It was an awful three days searching and marking the bodies where they lay. The casualties could not be moved as it was a scene of crime. What we saw and did was like a memory from hell. It was a scene of a battlefield, your mind could never take it in. I never slept the whole three days.” Afterwards David was diagnosed with PTSD and wrote, “It took a huge toll on many of us.”

Six years later he was on duty again after a Chinook carrying dozens of senior British intelligence chiefs crashed on the Mull of Kintyre. David said, “It was a grim job, with the aircraft still burning it was like a scene from a movie or hell, but this was real life. I was praying some would have survived. As we got nearer, the smell of fuel and smoke was everywhere. I dreaded what I would see.”

People don’t always realise when they are in danger but when they do the appearance of a rescue team brings great joy and relief. The Bible says that God has accomplished the greatest ever rescue and that Jesus Christ is the greatest rescuer. He died at great personal cost to save us from our sins by bearing on the Cross the penalty our sins deserve. A well-known hymn says, “Jesus sought me when a stranger, wandering from the fold of God; he, to rescue me from danger, interposed his precious blood.”