GSR searching for new members

By Christy Marsters

The Hants Journal/NovaNewsNow.com

The West Hants Ground Search and Rescue team is always scouting out for new recruits.

Barry White recently joined West Hants Ground Search and Rescue but he has been volunteering with search and rescue efforts in Nova Scotia for over 25 years.

The skills required to do the job are pretty basic with a good knowledge of map, compass and GPS reading, White said. “You just need to have the desire to be willing to help out.”

When the search and rescue team heads out to find someone who has been identified as missing, the experience is always different, White said. “But, no one is ever left alone.”

The active rescuers are given bearings to take and begin searches by checking in areas of high probability, where it is expected someone might be, White said. “Basically, we’re given an area, told what to do, and come back” to a command centre set for searchers.

Often rescuers get called out in the middle of the night but the efforts can be extremely rewarding, White added. “There’s nothing like bring a kid back into their mother’s arms.”

West Hants Ground Search and Rescue currently consists of about 30 volunteer members. The group meets regularly the last Sunday of the month and gets called out for searches or to help in mutual aid approximately two dozen times in a year.

Fred Horne is a longtime member with the West Hants Ground Search and Rescue Team.

Being a retired RCMP officer with the Windsor Detachment, Horne said he realized the value of this search team, and even after he became physically disabled, with a wheelchair for mobility, he continued to volunteer in this group because he knew he could still contribute. “The wheelchair restricts my movement in the woods,” Horne acknowledged. “However, I could still read a map, talk on the radio and keep track of people. There was no reason why I couldn’t be part of the command post. You don’t have to be mobile to contribute.”

Anyone who is interested in become a member with West Hants Search and Rescue can call president David Wood at the Search and Rescue Centre, 684-3410.