New team to search for vulnerable missing Islanders

Monday 17 February 2014

A new charity, made up of around 30 volunteers from the emergency services and St John’s Ambulance, has been set up to help the police deal with an increasingly common problem – vulnerable Islanders going missing.

The Jersey Search & Rescue (JSAR) team has already been called out several times to help search for people. Volunteer Paul Robinson said: “Jersey has its fair share of missing persons, and there isn’t always the day to day resource for the Police to deal with them, once in a while there are another 30 people on the floor to help search.

“We can only be called out by the States of Jersey Police, we will always work under their direction, they will decide on a case by case basis whether we need to be called out.”

The charity is accredited by the Association of Lowland Search & Rescue, which thanks to funding from Jersey Fire & Rescue, has helped train the volunteers. They’ve learnt how to deal with dementia sufferers, those at risk of suicide, mental health sufferers and young children. They plan to fundraise to make sure they maintain the Association’s required standards.

Mr Robinson said: “One of the things we really need to focus on is maintaining our standards, the training we’ve had is very good and very intensive but we need it to keep going, get the trainers over a few times a year to test us against their standards.”

He said that although the charity has an experienced team, it is always looking for keen people from all walks of life and whoever joins them will be fully trained.