Carlisle's battle for Nationwide League survival continued at Scunthorpe as the Cumbrians won by the odd goal of five to record only their second away win of the season.
After a nondescript opening, it was Carlisle who created an opening with a fine build-up and Peter Duffield drove home a low shot beyond Tom Evans in the 15th minute.
He might have added a second shortly afterwards. Chris Billy played the ball through following a long clearance but the veteran striker's effort was wayward.
Scunthorpe began to make their presence felt and Matthew Sparrow forced a brilliant one-handed save from Matt Glennon and then Terry Barwick's effort was on target but not strong enough to beat the keeper.
Paul Groves set up Scunthorpe's equaliser in the 28th minute with a free-kick collected by Steven MacLean who drove home a fine volley.
That gave the Iron confidence and they upped the tempo with Wayne Graves heading wide, Cleveland Taylor fired high and wide and Steve Torpey seeing a left-foot hooked shot stopped.
Glennon was quickly in action on the restart, palming away efforts by Taylor and Graves but Carlisle hit back and grabbed a second goal in the 55th minute when Mark Boyd hit a sweet left-foot shot from 18 yards.
Craig Farrell then drew a fine full-length save from Evans, before Glennon was called into action pushing out a low free-kick from MacLean.
Scunthorpe grabbed a 72nd minute equaliser from the spot. Brian Shelley brought Taylor down in the box and Maclean sent the keeper the wrong way from the spot.
Five minutes later the Cumbrians were back in front. Billy struck a tremendous right-foot drive from the left to give Evans no chance and from then on the visitors defended in depth to hang on to their lead.