Bilderberg.org

[TonyGosling]

http://shaphan.typepad.com/blog/2006/05/robin_cooks_mob.html

If Robin Cook was able to send a text message to his son one hour before he died (see previous post), wouldn't that mean that he had a mobile phone on him when he collapsed? So why was it widely reported that neither he nor Gaynor had mobile phones on them, so that she, when it happened, had to hail a passing group of walkers for help? Why didn't she use his mobile phone to call 999?

p.s. (2006.05.20) According to a couple of contemporaneous reports [here; here], Cook also telephoned and spoke to a Mail on Sunday journalist, Jonathan Oliver, in the hour of his death. What happened to Cook's phone? Did the authorities only find it among his belongings after they had put out the story of neither Cook having their mobiles with them?

p.p.s. The Scotsman had an interview with the paramedic who spoke to the second Mrs Cook and the mystery hill-walker for the 35 minutes until the helicopter arrived. This seems to be the origin of the report that neither had mobiles with them.

Heather MacKintosh, 29, took the initial emergency call at the Inverness HQ of the Scottish Ambulance Service from a man who came across the couple on Ben Stack, in north-west Sutherland. She said: "Mrs Cook was very upset, obviously, but I tried calming her down by getting her to help with her husband."

The first call came at 2:23pm from a man saying Robin Cook had suffered a heart attack 1,500ft up Ben Stack. It is believed Mr Cook had been unconscious for several minutes before the emergency call was received.

Miss MacKintosh said: "Neither Mr or Mrs Cook had a mobile. I don't know who the man who called was - he didn't give his name. But he said the casualty was Robin Cook. He remained very calm. I spoke to him on how to carry out CPR. When he handed the phone to Mrs Cook I spoke to her and she was very upset."

Perhaps the mystery man would have been less calm when he later discovered that Robin Cook had had his mobile phone on him and had used it at least twice from Ben Stack's summit.