This is an emergency service you need to know about in South Northants

South Northants may have no mountain or coastline for rescue services to be called out to, but we have our own Lowlands Search and Rescue team, NSAR available to us for when things go wrong.

Just like Coastguards and Mountain Rescue, the Lowlands Search and Rescue is a supportive role to the police, where a dedicated team of volunteers have been trained to the same specific standards used by the police and fire service. This means they have the knowledge, training and equipment to be a lifesaving partnership with the other emergency services.

But how vital is their work? If you have ever experienced a loved one go missing, whether that’s been due to an illness or condition, a mental health crisis, or just as an accident, you will know how heartbreaking it can be and you may hope there was a service who would be dedicated to help find them.

NSAR is a registered charity and is just one of roughly 33 Lowland Search and Rescue teams in the country that are alerted by local police to assist with missing people. Their trademark includes the statement ‘from hill to high water’, which is exactly the areas they cover across the country.

The NSAR team have all got specific areas they have been able to specialise in. Whether it is water rescue, communications and IT, drones, dog training or advanced first aid, the team have a wealth of skills that can be called on.

With a very busy year reported last year (2022), NSAR attended 93 incidents where they supported the county’s residents and assisted Northamptonshire Police and Northamptonshire Fire & Rescue Services.

Dave McBurnie, Search Manager and Lesley Stephenson, Search Technician and Search Planner met with the Chronicle and Echo to describe a typical call out and demonstrate the equipment they use.

The Fire Service in Northampton and Wellingborough keep the vehicles NSAR needs on their bases where they access their specialist equipment.

Lesley said: “The public don’t call us out, it’s the police who will do that. The volunteer team members can be on a search site anywhere in the county within 20 minutes and the vehicles with equipment can arrive at a search point within the hour.

“Each call out is different and we look at the profiles of our search technicians to work out the best fit for the job. For example, if a search area has water we would be looking for water trained technicians in particular.”

Dave said: “We are briefed on the missing person in our vehicle with the overseeing police search advisor and then plan the next steps.

“We use software called SARMAN, which is the same mapping programme for searches that the other emergency services use. We then build a case file together which we work from and create an initial 300m circle around the last point of where a missing person had been seen.”

Lesley added: “The search technicians are then sent out in teams of four, with one being a team leader and each team is designated a portion of the circle to search. This keeps our volunteers safe.”

There are about 60 volunteers at NSAR who cover many different aspects of the service. All volunteers have base line first aid training and can assist with a bleed, cardiac arrest and using a defibrilator.

Search dogs are also part of the NSAR team. Dog handlers have two fully trained search dogs and there are three more in training. Ted, Vesper, Duke, Spike and Otto are the canine team that assist on searches.

‘Simone the Drone’ has recently joined the team and there is currently a call to get more volunteers to help with this aspect of the search service. Both ‘spotters’ and pilots are needed to ensure the safe use of this equipment.

The three specialist vehicles are soon to become four, with a new addition on the way. Each of the vehicles are kitted out with the equipment needed for a search, including first class tea making facilities, sweets and biscuits for a variety of emergencies.

With the service only relying on donations and grants to function, NSAR are wanting to shout out to any organisations who are looking for a worthwhile charity to support. Clothes bank collections to support NSAR would also be really welcome.

The team is recruiting for new volunteers to join them, not just in search technician roles, but other ways too. Fundraising and administration are vital non-operative positions that would be worthwhile volunteering posts.

Lesley and David said: “We have such a diverse team of volunteers from so many different backgrounds. There are doctors, nurses, plumbers, builders, some are retired and others are just wanting to give something back to the community.”

You can find out more about the work NSAR do and the volunteering opportunities on their Facebook page and their website. There are very few south Northants based volunteers currently and they would welcome some support from this part of the county.

There are some great fundraisers you could get involved with too, such as abseilling down the Northampton lift tower.

Keep your eye out for these guys. They are in the red and black uniforms and easy to spot when they’re out working. You may just be thankful yourself for them one day.