A team of specially trained RSPCA inspectors were drafted in to carry out a potentially perilous rescue operation – to save a duck stuck in a culvert in Ironbridge.

The alarm was raised when the duck, a female mallard, was found water-logged and unable to fly off from the run of water at the bottom of a 20ft-deep cutting off Darby Road.

There was a time when the bird would probably have been left to its fate but, following horrendous floods which struck the region several years ago, the RSPCA set up a specialist National Swift Water Rescue Team.

Team members are trained to the highest standards of other emergency services and provided with specialist equipment to save animals from similar dangerous situations.

Risk

The duck rescue was deemed a job for the team and so Chief Inspector David Hollinshead, along with Inspector Dave McCartney and Mark Lewis, were drafted in to do the job.

Mr McCartney said: “We kitted up in special drysuits and clambered down to the culvert which was not only deep but there was always the risk of it being flooded at any time.

“While one of us blocked off the one end of the flow to stop the bird escaping, I managed to catch the duck while being held securely on a safety line.

“It was a tricky operation but an invaluable opportunity for us to put some of our training and equipment as members of the Swift Water Rescue Team into action.”

The whole operation took around an hour and the duck was left to go on it way, apparently none the worse for the ordeal.

By Simon Hardy