An air ambulance pilot was forced to employ down-to-earth shepherding skills after his helicopter was mobbed by sheep on Kirkstone Pass.

The Great North Air Ambulance landed on pastureland after being called to an injured cyclist who had fallen off his bike while descending The Struggle, near Ambleside.

Gazette reader Simon Whitfield, who photographed the incident, said: “The helicopter was quickly surrounded and mobbed by a flock of curious sheep, which encircled the chopper and its pilot. He had to use some shepherding skills in order to shoo them away so he could attend to the injured man.”