The Courier & Advertiser (Angus and Dundee)
Volunteers slam lack of rescue support
Mountain rescue teams hit out at police and Coastguard helicopter refusals
Scotland’s volunteer mountain rescue teams have accused air support agencies of abandoning them during missions.
The extraordinary attack saw the Tayside team, which saves lives in the Angus hills and mountains, join Cairngorm, Lochaber and Glencoe counterparts in slamming the protection they are given.
In a statement issued as the first snows of winter landed on the hills, they accused the Coastguard and Police Scotland of treating volunteers as “expendable” since a new contract was agreed.
The statement said the agencies “repeatedly” refuse to allow helicopters to clear volunteers from hills after rescues or use them to remove dead bodies.
It added: “The teams have decided that they can no longer accept an apparent casual disregard for the safety of the volunteers.”
Scotland’s mountain rescue teams have accused national air support agencies of “casual disregard” for the safety of volunteers during dangerous missions.
The Tayside team, alongside those in the Cairngorms, Lochaber and Glencoe, say helicopter crews from the coastguard – assisted in co-ordination with Police Scotland – are being instructed not to assist them with the recovery of people who have died in the mountains.
They also claim the agencies “repeatedly” refuse to allow helicopters to take volunteers home from the hills after missions.
This they say, is leaving mountain rescuers to travel miles through dangerous territory unassisted, often while transporting bodies.
The organisations say they have repeatedly raised the issue over the past few years but the response has been “severely lacking” in understanding.
The issue stems from the agreement of a new contract with the Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA) which, according to the teams, “does not make sufficient provision” for their safety.
Al Gilmour, spokesman for the independent Scottish Mountain Rescue Teams (iSMR), said the actions of the agencies were “wholly unacceptable”.
He said: “The team’s volunteers are well trained, well equipped, very capable and robust but they are not invincible.
“The teams have decided that they can no longer accept an apparent casual disregard for the safety of the volunteers.
“They (the agencies) clearly do not view the welfare of the volunteer teams as of significant enough importance as to warrant the continued air support to clear the hill.
“They have also been cheeky enough to say that the teams ‘should’ be able to make their own way off the hill.”
The statement, which comes as the first snow of the season falls on Scottish hills, explains that the air support agencies, through the terms of their contract, are refusing to assist in the final phase of rescues – after the “person in distress” has been uplifted.
Mr Gilmour said this meant leaving volunteers to fend for themselves on the hill.
“They may be many miles, thousands of feet of ascent/descent or both from their vehicles or access to a road,” he said.
“This is also often compounded by darkness and/or the weather.
“To give an impression of what this can mean, a volunteer can end up undertaking a difficult and dangerous thousand-foot cliff rescue in a remote location, over many hours, requiring large amounts of heavy technical gear, only to find that, once the casualty is on board, air support is withdrawn.
“This leaves the heavily laden team to return over the mountainous terrain for many hours. As with all rescue resources this also means that during this time the team is not available for any other incidents.
“The teams in iSMR simply object to being apparently seen as expendable by the agencies.”
The statement assured the public that “despite the apparent lack of support from certain agencies”, it would continue to “search for, rescue, and recover your loved ones.”
It stressed that any criticism was solely directed at the co-ordination of missions, and not at the crews.