Nottinghamshire Search and Rescue

13 July 2017 nottinghamshire Search & Rescue Team – Terry Smith & Dave Gratton

Before we started the meal a cheque presentation was made to Kate Rowlston, a student who had applied to our Community Fund to enable her to go on a Guide Leader Event to be held in the Netherlands in July 2018, where she would be doing some community work.

Kate enthusiastically explained that she had been in the Brownies/Guides organisation since she was 5 years old and had progressed to becoming a Leader and still loving it!

Terry, who is Vice Chair & Founder of NSART then gave us an insight into their organisation, founded only 5 years ago and now with 40 volunteer members. He outlined the major difference with Mountain Rescue, who generally know who and where there help is required, whereas they do not have that luxury. They are self-funding and are generally called out by the Police to help find our more senior citizens, suffering from dementia, who have left their Care home. They have regular specialist training and have people who can deal with flooding, water situations as well as a search dog.

There are 33 similar units throughout the UK, with 1500 members who have dealt with1805 call outs over the last 2 years.  In terms of cash, it’s estimated that they ‘save’ the Police around £3.8m per year!!

Dave went on to give some specific examples (although they haven’t been called out since last October, which is considered a blessing really).These covered a lady who had drowned in the River Trent, a young girl from Mansfield who had committed suicide. But he concluded with the story about an 85 year old man who had gone walking in North Muskham, fell at a fence, and was not found for about 25 hours, but found by NSART and lived to tell the tale, which was most uplifting for the Team. AR