At 15.57hrs this afternoon we were paged by Greater Manchester Police regards the team’s assistance with a developing search for a missing man in circumstances giving Police cause for concern for his welfare.

The call was answered by our Team Leader Garry Rhodes MBE, and as he and Team member Steve Fletcher were already at our Ladybridge Hall Base / HQ undertaking some administration work, they were able to immediately start preparing mapping of the intended search areas.

A full team pager call out was made at 16.11hrs with members rapidly meeting at our Ladybridge Hall Base / HQ for the intended 17.00hrs departure to the search area RVP.

The male concerned, a 26 year old from the Little Hulton area of Worsley, had been reported missing to Police earlier this same morning.

The search area involved a large amount of open grazing land and wooded thickets in the south Little Hulton area, bounded by Makants Farm, The Former Tyldesley to Worsley Railway Line (now under construction as a Guided Busway), New Manchester, and Engine Fold.

Arriving at circa 17.20hrs, a Search Control was established on land off Worsley Grove, Little Hulton.

Bolton MRT members joined in with a large GMP presence in the area, with the team being tasked initially to search alongside the operational Walkden to Wigan Railway line.

In view of the large amount of land to cover and nightfall, both Rossendale and Pendle MRT and Cheshire SART were contacted and placed on standby should their resources be required.

At circa 18.40hrs, news was received from GMP that a person matching the description of the missing person was reported from a nearby Country Park, way outside the planned search areas.

The Team was asked to ‘hold’ at the search RVP, and very soon afterwards the GMP search enquiry to locate the missing male changed focus to this new location, and the team was stood down at circa 19.20hrs as no longer being required.

The following resources were involved in this search operation:

• Greater Manchester Police: Force Control Room, 2x Police Missing Person Search Managers, Tactical Aid Unit Officers, Divisional Officers (Largely employed on House to House enquiries), two Police General Purpose Dog Units.
• National Police Air Service: Helicopter NPAS 21 from City Airport Manchester (Barton)
• Bolton Mountain Rescue Team: Four Land Rover Mountain Rescue Ambulance vehicles, our Minibus and our Incident Control Vehicle. 26x Team Call Out list members were present on scene and involved in the search, a further three Team members were stood down responding.
• SARDA (Wales) ; Mountain Rescue Trailing Search Dog Handler Steve Nelson and his Trailing Dog Boris (Steve is a Bolton MRT member, included in the figures above) were stood down responding, as was Bolton MRT member Elaine Gilliland, who acts as Steve’s navigator.
• Cheshire Search and Rescue Team: Declared 19x Team members available to assist and on standby should they be required (Not ultimately required)
• Rossendale and Pendle MRT: Declared 14x Team members immediately available with a further 5x later, to assist and on standby should they be required (Not ultimately required)