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Edale Mountain Rescue Team

Team Profile

Edale Mountain Rescue Team Photo

Edale Mountain Rescue Team (EMRT) operates within the UK's Peak District National Park as well as the rural areas of South Yorkshire and Derbyshire. We operate from our purpose built Headquarters within the LaFarge Cement Works at Hope. Whilst we primarily work for the Derbyshire Constabulary we are also called to assist South Yorkshire Police, East Midlands Ambulance Service and the Yorkshire Ambulance Service. This also means we work frequently with a number of Air Ambulance Organisations but particularly the Derbyshire, Leicestershire, Rutland Air Ambulance, the Yorkshire Air Ambulance and the Nottinghamshire and Lincolnshire Air Ambulance.

Due to the large number of outdoor activities carried out within our area, coupled with the high number of visitors/participants, Edale Mountain Rescue Team is one of the busiest mountain rescue teams in the country. Since the beginning of 2000 team members have been involved in over 900 incidents. These incidents have occurred whilst people have been partaking in nearly every outdoor activity possible on dry land or in the air; walking, climbing, fell running, mountain biking, horse riding, trials biking, hand gliding, paragliding, fixed wing gliding and even fishing. We also assist the police in incidents where our skills can be utilised in more rural locations. These predominantly involve searching for vulnerable people that have gone missing for various reasons and whose disappearance has cause concern. Edale Mountain Rescue Team members were also heavily involved the flood rescue operations in Sheffield during July 2007.

Edale Mountain Rescue Team is one of seven teams within the Peak District. We work very closely with Buxton Mountain Rescue Team and Glossop Mountain Rescue Team and have joint callout system for incidents that fall within the border areas of each team. This ensures that more people are deployed quickly to deal with any incident. We also have 2 search dog handlers who will be deployed to incidents with other teams anywhere in the country if their services are required.

As with all other UK teams, the team is made up entirely of volunteers who come from all walks of life and give up their time freely. We have 51 operational members and 12 aspirant members. Many of our members also work for the full time emergency services and health authorities. Currently within our ranks there are Doctors, Paramedics, Nurses, Fire-fighters and Police Officers as well as people from a host of other professions - Tax Inspector, Blind Fitter, Academic, Student, Salesman, Civil Engineer to name but a few!

Team members train on a regular basis to refresh and improve on old skills as well as learning new ones. This includes advanced first aid/casualty care, rope rescue, search techniques, water safety, stretcher handling, equipment familiarisation and maintenance to name but a few. Due to the number of calls we receive for people suffering from serious injuries it is a requirement that team members hold the Mountain Rescue Casualty Care certificate.

Edale Mountain Rescue Team receives no central funding from government and we rely entirely on donations to raise the money we need to run the team, which is generally in the region of £50,000 per annum. All monies raised are used to improve the service we offer to the public by investing in equipment maintenance and renewal, training for members, running our 3 response vehicles and 1 search control vehicle; as well as planning for a secure financial future for the team. The majority of monies raised are through the hard work of team members. However we are supported in this task by our valued support group "Friends in High Places" who have been assisting us since 2001.

Edale Mountain Rescue Team Continued...