Galloway Mountain Rescue Team provides search and rescue assistance to the public in an area covering over 130 km (80 miles) from Stranraer in the west to Dumfries in the east, and 70 kms (40 miles) from the Solway Coast to the South Ayrshire Hills and whilst doing this they need the very best of equipment that they can get. Last weekend the received their latest bit of high tech kit that is in service reday to save lives straight away.
In the early 90’s, Galloway MRT managed all of its search and rescue operations from a custom designed boxvan trailer. With nothing more than a radio, map and pencil, our search managers bunkered down amongst our equipment to plan personnel deployment, rescue strategies and liaise with other emergency services. This boxvan trailer was towed by our Land Rover Defender, and dropped off at key places during an incident.
In 2012 however, with support from Sainsbury’s, we managed to buy an ex-police van from Dumfries Galloway Police Division and converted the interior to what was at the time, the ideal set up. The rescue equipment was now separate to the incident control area – allowing for managers and leaders to come into an enclosed environment to discuss sensitive information, invite other emergency service managers and officers to control an incident from the one table, and of course be nice and warm! As much as we make the joke of our search managers being all warm back at ‘control’ while the rest of the team are out in the rain and snow – they often have to sit for up to 8 hours at times in the same freezing conditions. The difference is that the rest of the team are keeping warm by walking. Having a van-based incident control allowed us not only to transport more team members to incidents, but be able to move the incident control as an incident develops. Previously, we would have had to call the Land Rover back from service to tow the trailer elsewhere.
However in 2018, we took delivery of our custom designed 4×4 Ford Transit. This latest addition to our rescue fleet is packed full of the latest technology to assist with not only search and rescue operations, but all kinds of major incidents – aircraft crash, forest fires, mass casualties, flooding, snow storms etc. The all new Ford Transit is registered as an Ambulance, which allows the interior configuration to be adapted to accept a casualty on a stretcher. This means the vehicle can be used as a response vehicle as well as an incident control vehicle. Onboard, our search managers have access to the internet for incident data recording via an automatic satellite, VFH radios, GPS tracking, welfare facilities, laptops and printers. It allows us to have a direct connection to Police, Fire and Ambulance control rooms – as well as working independently to manage major incidents with Dumfries and Galloway Council‘s Emergency ‘Bunker’ – should the area loose landline phones, mobile phones and internet again – as happened during the floods and snow storms.
A Spokes person from the team said “We would like to thank everyone who has supported the team in any way, from sponsorship to donations over the years, and allowed us to replace our incident control vehicles. Galloway MRT are one of only a few search and rescue teams in the country that has such an advanced control vehicle – with such facilities available to us now, missing people could be found quicker, and communities supported more in major incidents.”
On call 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, in all conditions. www.gallowaymrt.org.uk
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