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28th June 2010 BIG LOTTERY AWARD FOR MOUNTAIN RESCUE TEAM
BIG LOTTERY AWARD FOR MOUNTAIN RESCUE TEAM
The Teesdale & Weardale Search & Rescue Team have been awarded £10,000 from the Big Lottery Fund to support their Water Rescue Project.
The need for this project has been identified over the past few years with the increase in flood and water related incidents. The Team has always worked to train and equip its volunteers to respond to search incidents near water, in the past helping out with the floods at South Church Co. Durham, and more recently being deployed to assist in the Cumbrian floods. As the need for trained and equipped organisations has developed especially in the flood arena the Team has looked at its own training and resources. To be of maximum effectiveness several shortfalls were identified – with this Big Lottery Fund those gaps can be filled.
Chris Roberts Deputy Team Leader said "The money is to fund the purchase of 2 rescue rafts, each with a slightly different design, suitable for rescue in most types of water be that flood, moving or still. This will be vital equipment for our swiftwater rescue technicians. Thanks to this award we will be able to become a fully equipped and active responder to any flood incidents that may occur within County Durham and beyond if required".
"Over the next few weeks we will be negotiating the best possible prices for the rafts to suit our needs – we look forward to a follow up press release showing pictures of our new equipment in action".
"As with all of the work undertaken by a voluntary organisation such as ours, donations by bodies such as the Big Lottery and of course the generous donations by the public are our life blood. Now that this project is established it will need to be sustained and we are confident that this can be achieved. As a reminder the Teams recently publish book ’40 Years and Counting’ is available at many shops, details on our website www.twsmrt.org.uk"
All attached pictures - (Team members practicing throwline rescue in River Tees) - Copyright: Iain D Kitchen
Notes For Editor Teesdale
& Weardale Search & Mountain Rescue Team are affiliated to the "Mountain
Rescue - England and Wales". We provide a Search and Rescue service throughout
County Durham and beyond primarily for the Police but also for the other emergency
services. All Team members are volunteers and we rely on monies raised by ourselves
as a registered charity to run the Team. Further details regarding our latest
callouts and Team information can be found on our website www.twsmrt.org.uk
