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Annual Review 2020 0 2 0 2 Mountain Rescue England and Wales Annual Review 2020 0 2 0 2 y a M d e h s i l b u P 1 Foreword HRH The Duke of Cambridge Opposite top: HRH The Duke of Cambridge © Chris Jackson. Main photo: Woodhead team members attend a casualty, close to Woodhead Pass © Woodhead MRT. Cover photo: Buxton MRT on a night rescue © Carney James Turner. 3 F E I R B N I I cannot sit here in April 2020, thinking about writing an 9 1 2761 annual review that runs from May through to April, without 0 saying a few words about the pandemic happening 2 call•outs around us. It’s been a fast-changing situation but, from the start of the coronavirus, we have endeavoured to give clear advice to all our member teams. M O R F statuto ry Our aim has always been to ensure we 33 could continue to be there for the injured agencies walkers and climbers who needed our assistance, and on call to find those who are vulnerable and missing from home, whilst also protecting our team members. Their health was — and continues to be — our priority. Our teams and regions have come together to share paperwork and plans, mountain and information about their availability 2resc1u5e te5am and resources, coordinated by a small ‘Covid -1 9 team’, meeting online weekly. deplo yments Mountain rescue members have stood up to be counted. Beyond our own organisation, we have shared information with other volunteer search and rescue organisations — Scottish Mountain Rescue, Lowland Rescue and British Cave Rescue — in In November, we signed off a new the belief that working together was the constitution, taking our charity into a CIO only way to ensure we could all manage — a major project which has taken the pandemic. about four years to complete. 2011 Covid -19 may currently be foremost in Looking at our work over winter, it’s fair pearsssistoedns our thoughts but, throughout the year, to say it was another wet one, with a our team members have continued to number of teams once again called in give their time freely to help others who to support their flooded communities. need their help. The incident statistics Flooding has become a core task for for 2 01 9 are not yet finalised but the mountain rescue, alongside supporting current figures show that we attended the police and ambulance service, and 27 61 incidents — up again on 20 18. going to the aid of hill and fell walkers, 10vo0lu,n0te0er 0 + During 20 19, we visited every region climbers and mountaineers who need to talk with the memb ership about what our help. rescue r–hours MREW does for its members and the Due to the coronavirus, this year we will feedback from that has produced s ome have our first online AG M in May. This would great ideas to take forward. have been my last, after six years in the In summer, the Peak District teams role, but I agreed to continue for a further hosted the Princes’ Charity Day and Mid two years — little knowing what was S Pennine teams worked with the JD around the corner with Covid -19! Foundation on their Charity Day. We help Finally, when this pandemic is done Y put together these annual events to give and life returns to ‘normal’, mountain something back to the children’s charities rescue teams — and MREW — will need supported by our Royal patron and some your support, perhaps more than ever, A * of our major funders. to enable us to continue supporting our In Sep tember, we held our national communities across England and conference, the first for several years and Wales. Stay safe and well out there! D SEO one of the best I have been to! without a mountain rescue call-out NO CHANGE FROM 2018 Opposite: Upper Wharfedale team members attend a female walker on Malham Moor © Sara Spillet. Mike France Above: Duddon & Furness team members in action during their Peer Review weekend © DFMRT. 4 5 * Organised mountain rescue in England and Wales dates back to the 1930s, and the number of incidents has grown over time with the growth in outdoor activities. Many teams have formed (and sometimes merged or divided) A snapshot of the over the decades, to service popular areas, with 49 teams currently in England and Wales. In late 2 01 9, Rob Shepherd , MREW Statistics Officer, analysed the data we have to see how the numbers have changed over 2019numbers since 1990 the years. These were some of his findings. MOUNTAIN RESCUE CALL-OUTS BY ACTIVITY Since 1990 ANNUAL TREND: OVER ALL TYPES OF INCIDENTS TO 2 017 CASUALTY AGE GROUPS: PERCENTAGE OF SUBJECTS BY AGE CATEGORY 2000 14 3in7c,id0e0n0ts + 1800 1600 12 1400 10 1200 8 1000 HILL WALKING 3ca5sua,0lties0 an0d + 800 6 MISSING PERSON missing persons 600 4 LOCAL INCIDENT 400 2 Approaching 200 MOUNTAIN BIKING 0 0 CLIMBING/SCRAMBLING >4 >9 >14 >19 >24 >29 >34 >39 >44 >49 >54 >59 >64 >69 >74 >79 80+ OTHER 1989 1994 1999 2004 2008 20 13 20 17 20 19 2 vmoluinllteieor n rescuer-hours SEASONAL IMPACT: BY WEEK OF YEAR TO 2 017 RISING INCIDENT NUMBERS: SNAPSHOTS BY REGION CASUALTY CONDITION Last year Call-out rate is predominantly influenced by fine weather and public holidays. More people enjoying fine weather equates to the expectation of higher incident numbers. 800 The spikes surrounding the summer months are half-term holidays and Easter breaks. 700 1997 600 2007 2017 500 400 2,inc1id5en0 ts + 300 per year 200 100 0 UNHURT LDSAMRA MPSRO NESRA NWMRA PDMRO PENMACRA SWERA SWSARA YDRP MINOR The graph shows how the increasing numbers differ by region, decade on SERIOUS decade. Some regions have seen an increase of 40% between 1997 –2017 FATAL 1 4 8 12 16 20 24 28 32 36 40 44 48 52 casualties and + but others have increased 3-fold or more in the same period. UNKNOWN 2mis,si0ng p0erso0 ns * Absolute call-out numbers are not important here – the shape of the chart shows the ‘Serious Injuries’ are those that per year relative week-by-week call-out pattern suggest a reasonable risk to life (or would suggest an overnight * Spikes at weeks 1 and 52 are due to ‘ambulance-assist’ call-outs (snow/ice affecting stay in hospital and is a better statutory ambulance attendance at busy times for them, over Christmas and New Year). category to focus on, rather than There is also a slight rise in hill-walking incidents during this holiday period. fatalities. This category also gives 10vo0lu,n0te0er 0 + us a good number for ‘lives saved’ (at least this number) – and rescuer-hours represents a good few hundred Main photo: Snowdonia © Sean Wareing l Pixaby. per year. Top right: Harrogate search involving UWFRA © Sara Spillet. 7 S R O T C A F Ray Griffiths has been involved with mountain rescue T were attributed to N Human error for over 50 years, mainly as a member of Patterdale A C 14 % MRT and, for the last three years, as president of MREW. I F And he reckons that meeting so many of those involved I 10 N in mountain rescue across England and Wales has given G I him ‘a wonderful perspective on the work of the charity, S the service and everyone involved’. ‘3inc8iden3 ts ’ I’d like to focus on three elements. They’re all someone else’s baby — but I think it’s part of my role as president to encourage and reinforce where I see good things happening. The first is the move to charitable incorporated organisation (CIO) status. This has involved a huge amount of work by MREW trustees, the executive officers and others. I’d particularly like to thank trustee Jake Bharier for giving MREW the benefit of his experience in governance. Both Jake and Mike France, our Senior Executive Officer, have done a sterling job in driving this change and engaging with mountain rescue teams at every stage. I hope that their investment in communications will pay off in the years to come as I think it’s been really good for the organisation. The second element is the work being done with the Mountain Heritage Trust (MHT) to develop a significant Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) bid. This is all about capturing the history and heritage of mountain rescue in England and Wales and I strongly believe that our heritage is a valuable route into understanding mountain rescue as it is now. By explaining ‘interested general public’ and the history issues and guidance on how to provide what we’ve done in the past, we can really captured their interest. support where needed. show people today how much we need The bid was postponed during the Mountain rescue volunteers have their support, both financial and practical. COVID -1 9 outbreak but, if successful, it always needed to be aware of these Two recent occasions brought this will be the first stage in capturing key things for casualties and their families home to me. I was invited by Terry Tasker people and milestones on video, while and friends. There is often a need to of MHT (and sister of Joe) to speak at a also learning how to identify and archive come back and meet those who’ve community forum at Malton in Yorkshire. the artefacts that tell our story. been involved in saving a life as part of Ian Hugill of Scarborough and Ryedale Finally, I’ve been impressed by the dealing with injuries, both physical and MRT also came along with a rescue developments in mental health and mental.
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