Three incidents and an assist at a road crash in one day

One of our First Responders had a busy afternoon!  (First Responders are team members who take the initial request for assistance from the Police, Ambulance Service, other Rescue Teams, etc)

The first call was to assist with a search for a vulnerable missing person in the Rhyl area.  Two SARDA Wales search dog handlers who are also NEWSAR members, were nearby and heading for home after a dog training session – they were tasked to assist with this search, and were joined by another SARDA handler who is a member of our neighbouring lowland team, Cheshire SAR..  They were later stood down when new information suggested that the missing person was no longer in our area.

Whilst still dealing with the previous incident, the First Responder received a call for assistance from the Police.  Dyfed Powys Police had received a call from a woman walking alone in the Berwyn Mountains, after she became disorientated in an area that is not easy to navigate in at the best of times.  The First Responder managed to make telephone contact with the lost walker, and using Smartphone technology he was able to get an accurate location for her – the intention was then to give directions to the walker to help her walk to safety, but phone contact was intermittent so the Team was called out as a precautionary measure.  As NEWSAR members were arriving at the RV (assembly point) for the search, the walker phoned the First Responder to say that she had managed to get down to a farmhouse and was safe and well – we hope the experience will not put her off future trips into the mountains.

One of our team members travelling to this search came across a serious road traffic accident near Llangollen – he diverted from the search incident to assist emergency services at the scene.

Whilst the previous two incidents were still on the go, the First Responder received yet another call for assistance, this time from North Wales Police, and another of our responders stepped in to  assist with the initial actions.  A member of the public had phoned the police to express concern for a person in a tent on a hillside near Llangollen – the person had appeared to the informant to be unwell.  Unfortunately, details were sketchy and the stand-in responder attempted to get more information from the original caller.  Several attempts to make contact failed, and the incident was passed back to the Police to investigate further.