Dundonnell MRT Area

Our area extends to 6,700 km2 stretching from Inverness to the west coast and from Invermoriston to Ardgay. We cover 41 Munros, including An Teallach and Ben Wyvis and 74 other hills of note. Besides large areas of dense forest and moorland we also serve several remote ranges including Fisherfield, the Fannichs, Glen Affric and Strathfarrar.

Our team and activities

We have 30 volunteers and another 8 in training plus some retired members on a reserve list. Besides being a multi-disciplinary team with specialist skills in mountaineering, first aid, Casualty Care, search management, and rescue techniques, we also help in low ground searches. Currently, we are undertaking more intensive training in retrieving casualties from river gorges. Members are trained to operate with both the S-92 and AW189 helicopters and we maintain a very good relationships with the HM Coastguard crews at Stornoway and Inverness, as well as Police Scotland, neighbouring teams and the Scottish Ambulance Service.

The number of callouts and their outcomes varies from year-to-year and is unpredictable but, typically, we have 25-30 callouts a year. 

Assets

We have 3 bases: at Dundonnell, Ullapool and Dingwall, the latter two each house a fully-equipped 4×4 rescue vehicle. Further 4×4 rescue vehicles are kept at Gairloch and Cannich. A 10-seater minibus, housed at Dingwall, is being replaced with a bespoke 4×4 command and control vehicle. 

Finance

Annual grants from the Scottish Government and Police Scotland provide extremely welcome core funding. However, allied with careful financial management, these have to be supplemented by our own fundraising activities to attract enough income to cover our full operating costs plus an operating reserve. We have also successfully undertaken project specific fundraising, notably to enable development of our new Dingwall base (2017), to replace two 4×4 pick-ups (2018), and new satellite phones and defibrillators (both 2019).