Well as the NWAS HART team had had an emergency call tonight we didn’t want to miss out on an incident, so maybe we shouldn’t have been surprised when at 23.16hrs this evening Lancashire Constabulary paged us for immediate assistance with a developing search in the Turton and Chapeltown area north of Bolton.

A vulnerable 19 years old young man with a medical condition had gone missing from his home address in the Edgworth area during this same evening in circumstances that required an intensive search of a large area to try to locate him as soon as possible.

Following an initial team standby page at 23.21hrs, a full team call out page was initiated at 23.30hrs, with all team members requested to assemble as quickly as possible at our Ladybridge Hall Base / HQ whilst our Team Leader Garry Rhodes MBE and Deputy Team Leader Geoff Seddon liaised with Lancashire Constabulary Officers regards a search plan.

As team members were assembling, family and friends of the missing young man and local villagers were already assisting the first responding Police Officers with searches in the Edgworth, Turton and Chapeltown areas.

Incredibly given the timescale of this incident and our call out times, two members were on scene by 23.30hrs and straight away commenced a search of the closeby Turton and Entwistle Reservoir margins.

With an immediate search plan being formulated in liaison with Police and with advice from the brother of the missing man, by 00.25hrs on Thursday 29th April, two further MRT search parties were deployed.

By this stage a Police ’General Purpose’ Dog Team had also searched a number of areas in association with Divisional Police Officers and the Lancashire Constabulary Air Support Unit Helicopter.

Our Team Leader at this stage had also called out an MR Trailing Dog and was further consulting with the Team Leader of Rossendale and Pendle MRT regards their assistance, given the likely huge size of the potential search area.

At approximately 00.30hrs came the fantastic news that the young man had been located safe and well within the yard of a farm just on the edge of Chapeltown village.

Incredibly it appears that following a ’Facebook’ appeal to help find the missing young man, a local young resident in Chapeltown village glanced out of their bedroom window overlooking a farm yard and spotted the missing young man, contacting Police Officers who immediately went to the assistance of the man.
Very happily quickly reunited with his family, this was a fantastic end to a search that was giving great concern to all involved.

The following resources were deployed or responding to this search ;

• Bolton MRT 22x Team call Out List members.
• Bolton MRT All five team vehicles, including our four Land Rover MR Ambulances, Minibus and Control Trailer. (We also arrived with pre printed mapping of the area, food and drink)
• Mountain Rescue Trailing Dog Team, Handler Iain Nicholson and Dog Mij, from SARDA (Wales) / Bowland Pennine MRT. (Stood down responding)
• Rossendale and Pendle MRT. (Our Team Leader was requesting their attendance via their Team Leader Andy Simpson, when the news was received that the young man had been located)
• Lancashire Constabulary Air Support Unit Helicopter.
• Lancashire Constabulary 1x General Purpose Dog Team.
• Lancashire Constabulary local Divisonal Officers.
• Lancashire Constabulary 1x Operational Support Unit Team.
• Family and friends of the missing young man and local villagers.