Today we hosted a large search exercise, primarily held on behalf of Greater Manchester Police, in order to provide a Search Management training opportunity for some of their recently qualified Search Managers, ( Missing Persons ). Organised by Team member and GMP Search Manager, Chris Moody, 7x other GMP Search Managers took part, some as Observer / tutors, others as active players.

The assembled masses of Bolton MRT and our colleagues from ALSAR, Cheshire Search & Rescue Team.

33x Bolton Team members took part, as well as our Search Dog Chi. We were joined by our colleagues from the latest ALSAR Team to form, 14x members of Cheshire Lowland Search and Rescue Team.
Centred on Blackleach Country Park, and the adjoining Linear Parkway system, in the northern part of Walkden, Worsley, the exercise was based on a Missing Person scenerio. As with any exercise, there were the usual injects, including an exercise casualty incident, which took the form of a serious assault / mugging, and an observation test to find four bright yellow plastic ducks, scattered throughout the search area. Congratulations to Bolton members Neil Ramsbottom and Mark Scott for finding two ducks, the other two, well maybe they were hiding from our searchers!

We were also joined by the GMP Air Support Unit helicopter, which provided the ever vital aerial search element.
Commencing at 10.00am and finishing at 4.00pm, the exercise overall was judged a great success, with the new Search Managers benefitting from forging links with the Bolton Team, and the members of Cheshire LSART benefitting from exposure to the ” MRT ” way of doing things.

Searchers enjoying the facilities of Tina’s eats.

As ever a good search ( the Bolton way ) relies on the steady supply of Tea, Coffee, Soup and a variety of Bacon Barms and Chilli Specials, at every opportunity, so a big thanks to Bolton Team helpers Tina Tennant and Paul Lawrence, for manning our Catering Trailer ( Tinas Eats ) throughout the whole exercise. We even got a bacon barm / hot tea send off from our base at the start of the exercise!/
A special thankyou to City of Salford Ranger Ian White, who kindly opened the Visitor Centre for us, to utilise as a Police Control, Briefing Point and for those of us usually cross legged on this type of exercise, we also had the use of the Visitor Centre toilets. Ian White was on hand throughout the day and even cleaned up after us!
All in all an excellent joint exercise.