Early morning pager call from Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service

On the night when most benefitted from the extra hour in bed, we were all awoken at 01.13hrs (02.13hrs but for the hour change!) by a pager call to contact Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service Control Room.

Answered by both our Team Leader Garry Rhodes MBE and Deputy Team Leader Geoff Seddon, it was quickly determined that GMFRS wanted help in contacting Calder Valley SRT regarding a person lost on the moors above Todmorden, as told to Geoff Seddon.

Geoff Seddon passed on contact details for Calder Valley SRT to GMFRS Control then at 01.22hrs paged out to the rest of our team that the call was for Calder Valley SRT and no action was required from Bolton MRT.

So all went back to bed, except our Team Leader, who having contacted a different GMFRS control room operator to Geoff, was asked the same question but told the person was lost on the moors between Wardle and Todmorden, possibly putting the missing person within the operational area covered by the Rossendale and Pendle MRT.

Garry agreed to contact RPMRT on behalf of GMFRS, so in turn woke up Andy Simpson, Team Leader of RPMRT (why should he be enjoying a good nights sleep when we had all been woken up!)

It turned out he too had been contacted by GMFRS, but only told the information about the person missing being near Todmorden, so similarly passed on information to contact Calder Valley SRT to GMFRS.

With the ’new’ information about Wardle, Andy Simpson then made further calls.
Job done (At least concerning our Team) at around 01.35hrs Garry finally got to bed.

And the outcome …… well Andy contacted GMFRS, and based on more information decided the call was indeed in Calder Valley MRTs area, so liaised and passed the call to Calder Valley SRT for their action. (What then happened will no doubt be reported on the website of Calder Valley SRT)