History

The History of Ochils Mountain Rescue Team by Laura Alexander (Deputy Team Leader).

Ochils MRT commenced operations in September of 1971. It was the brainchild of the Sport and Outdoor Director of Clackmannanshire County Council and brought together members of the Ochils Mountaineering Club and the local Scout Association, led by the Scout leader of Menstrie Scout troop. Menstrie Scouts provided space in their Scout hall well into the early 90s, and it was designated an official Mountain Rescue Post in 1977when Ochils MRT were elected as a full member of the Mountain Rescue Committee of Scotland (MRC of S).

Initially there was very little equipment but this gradually built up through public subscription and assistance from Alloa Rotary. Our first Stretcher was funded by a charity Concert given by the Corries at the Albert halls in Stirling, which got us a MacInnes Mark 1 folding stretcher. The team had no radios and no vehicles, team members used their own cars for transporting team equipment with team leaders running call outs from their cars.

It wasn’t until the early 1980s that we managed to obtain 6 Radios via a fund raiser organised by Alloa Rotary. This was augmented by a redundant Westminster base Set given to us by the Police, which was rigged up with a rechargeable battery which could be plugged into a cigar lighter in a car plus a magnetic aerial to go on the roof.

There was a wide range of people in the team, including teachers, engineers, technicians, butchers, chefs, builders, doctors and many more. Training consisted of 10 Sunday training sessions a year because the Central Scotland Police insurance would only cover us for that. Some training was supported by the Sports department at The University of Stirling who had two Mountain Instructors and an outdoor centre based at Rannoch.

As Central Scotland Police realised the value of Mountain Rescue, they helped form the Central Scotland Rescue group with Killin and Lomond MRTs. They gave some financial support in the form of equipment purchases and were able to increase insurance cover for more training. By the 1980s Wednesday evenings and a summer and winter training weekend were added in. Helicopter Training started in 1983 - each team was allowed 30 minutes We worked with RAF Leuchars until the Navy took over from Prestwick and now work with the MCA and Bristows.

Initially the team were called out by the Police working their way down a list of team members phone numbers till they found someone who was at home, though later we were able to join the Central Scotland Police and Fire Services pager system until mobile phones took over. The introduction of new IT technology has made huge changes in the way we manage callouts. Every team member now has an advanced VHF digital radio.

We have been fortunate to have many team members who were pharmacists, nurses paramedics or doctors. We were perhaps the first team in Scotland to take up the Cascare advanced first aid qualification, after we were joined by a Charge Nurse who had moved up from England who had MR experience and had been instrumental in setting up Cascare down in England.

In the mid 1990s the Menstrie Scouts required more space and we had to leave our base in Menstrie. Central Scotland Police helped us out by by giving us access to a garage at Tillicoultry Police station as a temporary measure, after about 2 years we were able to rent a double garage which had become available at Clackmannanshire Council’s Nurseries. In 2010 we moved into our present post in Fishcross which was custom built, funded by the Order of St John, with the team fitting out the inside.

Our first land Rover was a used vehicle which we bought from Lomond MRT, funded by public subscription. Later we received a brand new Land Rover under a scheme set up by the Order of St John, and later a second one. Our first support vehicle was a Ford Transit van which had belonged to Central Scotland Police as their Firearms support vehicle. The conversion was carried out by team members. When this was beyond repair, through grant funding we were able to replace it with a new custom built vehicle which is still in use.

Ochils MRT today

Today Ochils MRT has 2 landrovers and a mobile base van, a purpose built Mountain Rescue Post in Fishcross and 42 members. When the RAF left Leuchars, Fife was no longer covered by the RAF MRT and so Fife was added to Ochils MRT’s territory. It now covers the whole of Fife, Clackmannanshire, Falkirk and Stirling.

A particular feature of the Ochils is their deep gorges behind Dollar, Alva, Tillicoultry and Menstrie. In recent years these have become popular with canyoners, but we have also had incidents with dogs and people slipping off paths into them and needing rescued. Unlike most rescue teams who can aim to use gravity to help evacuate their casualties downhill, in these situations we tend need to raise them up out of the gorge, leading to some interesting ropework challenges. Even outside the gorges, the south side of the Ochils are very steep, generally made up of rotten conglomerate which won’t take rock protection, and with lots of gorse growing out of it. If you come across us in the Ochils, you may get the chance to see our ‘hedgehogs’ in action – heavy duty ground anchors that we can use on steep grassy ground.

You never know when a callout comes in whether it is going to involve a long walk over boggy grassy lumps, rushing up the tourist path to Dumyat or technical work on very unpleasant ground. This year has been a bumper year for callouts, probably partly due to Covid encouraging people to discover their local hills. There have been 40 callouts this year, taking over 1500 hours of team members’ time. Callouts have been a real mix, everything from helping the police with searches for missing people in rural areas to rescuing paragliders, hillwalkers, hill runners and mountain bikers from the hills.