A couple missing on a Scottish mountain range overnight as temperatures plunged to minus 10C are "lucky" to be alive, according to rescue teams.

A major search involving 97 rescue personnel was launched at first light on Saturday after the husband and wife from Northern Ireland failed to return from a trek in the Cairngorms.

The Braemar Mountain Rescue team found 36-year-old man and his 33-year-old wife, who have not been named, as they attempted to make their way down the mountain.

The couple had set out from the Coire Cas ski-lift car park near Aviemore on Friday morning but the alarm was raised when they failed to return by 2040 GMT that evening.

Temperatures on the Cairngorms got down to around minus 10 last night, so they are very lucky to be safe and well Sergeant Michael MacLennan Northern Constabulary

Severe winter weather on the hills made it impossible for the RAF rescue helicopter to conduct a night search for the couple.

Mountain rescue teams from Cairngorm, Braemar, Ballater and Grampian Police, as well as specially-trained search and rescue dogs, began combing the area for the couple on Saturday.

Fears had been growing for the couple's safety when members of the Braemar mountain rescue team managed to locate the pair on the mountains at about 0930 GMT.

They were taken to the Glenmore Lodge mountaineering centre near Aviemore to be assessed. However they were said to be "safe and well".

Sergeant Michael MacLennan of the Northern Constabulary admitted the couple were lucky to be alive.

He said: "Temperatures on the Cairngorms got down to around minus 10 last night, so they are very lucky to be safe and well."