CONTACT:
Lieutenant Mark Ober
603-788-4850
603-271-3361
September 5, 2023
Kilkenny, NH – Sunday afternoon at approximately 2:15 p.m., Fish and Game Conservation Officers were notified of an injured hiker via a 911 call. The hiker had been descending Bunnell Notch Trail when he tripped and suffered an unknown leg injury.
A rescue response was initiated with Conservation Officers and volunteers from Androscoggin Valley Search and Rescue (AVSAR) responding. The hiker, identified as Scott Briggs, 37, of Windham, ME, had been hiking with a group of 10 people when the injury occurred. While awaiting rescuers, a member of his party splinted the injured leg.
Briggs and his hiking partners had departed earlier in the day from the Unknown Pond Trailhead off York Pond Road in Berlin. They had completed approximately 7.8 miles of a 10.6-mile loop, which consists of Unknown Pond Trail, Kilkenny Ridge Trail, and Bunnell Notch Trail, when the incident occurred.
The shortest distance to Briggs’s location was to take the old Mt. Cabot Trail from East Lancaster up to the Kilkenny Ridge Trail to the Bunnell Notch Trail which is approximately 2.8 miles. Conservation Officers were able to utilize ATVs to get within 1.5 miles of Briggs. Other responding rescuers hiked in the entire distance to reach him.
After rescuers arrived on scene, they packaged Briggs into a litter and started the carryout at 6:30 p.m. He was carried down the trail, arriving at the ATVs at 7:40 p.m. Briggs was placed on the back of an ATV and driven down to Community Camp Road where he was transferred to the Lancaster Ambulance at approximately 8:30 p.m. From there he was transported to Weeks Medical Center for treatment of his injury.