Hiker’s fall in Werribee Gorge forces Boxing Day chopper rescue

SES rescue crews had were called out to a popular hiking track in Melbourne west after a man suffered a nasty fall.

A hiker was flown to The Alfred with lower body injuries after falling down a cliff in Werribee Gorge State Park on December 26.

A bushwalker was rushed to hospital after a serious fall in Melbourne’s west left the man stranded on a popular walking trail.

The man in his 40s was hiking in the Werribee Gorge State Park on Boxing Day, when he fell off the track in the late afternoon — tumbling 10m down a steep embankment.

A SES Victoria spokesman said the emergency service personnel were called to the scene to rescue the man, who had fractured his ankle.

“All agencies worked together to treat the patient, bring him back up to level ground and then extricate him to the ambulance waiting in the carpark,” he said.

Volunteers from the Bacchus Marsh unit were called to the scene about 5pm, completing the extraction shortly after 10.15pm.

A hiker in his 40s was flown to The Alfred with lower body injuries after falling down a cliff in Werribee Gorge State Park on December 26. Picture: Bacchus Marsh SES

The rescue was a combined effort by SES, Ambulance Victoria and Victoria Police. Picture: Bacchus Marsh SES

The man was rushed by helicopter to The Alfred hospital in a stable condition with lower body injuries, according to an Ambulance Victoria spokeswoman.

The fall comes less than a week after a man and a woman were rescued from the same area after becoming stranded on a 150m cliff face overnight.

The duo, a 25-year-old man from Mill Park and a 36-year-old woman from Doncaster, had set out on a 3.5km hike to Falcons Lookout but became lost in the dangerous terrain on December 20.

Stuck on the “precarious” track, the pair were forced to wait about three hours for a police helicopter to winch them to safety shortly after midnight.