The Team was born in June 2007 and adopted its first formal constitution in January 2008. We registered as a charity in the following month.
It began as a small group of water rescue enthusiasts who trained as Community First Responders in the Worcester area. The team’s name was originally West Midlands Search and Rescue but later aligned with West Mercia Police area to become WEST MERCIA SEARCH AND RESCUE.
In 2010, members received commendations from the West Midlands Ambulance Service for their ‘above and beyond’ response during Worcester’s floods that year.
In 2011 we received a one-off grant from DEFRA to “train and equip a team which can provide flood-rescue capabilities across the UK when needed”. This enabled the team to grow to 24 members, all of whom were trained as boat crew and flood-rescue technicians. This heritage has provided the base for the current team.
In 2011, the team was accepted as a member of the Association of Lowland Search and Rescue, which governs the provision and training standards of Lowland Rescue teams across the UK.
In 2012, the team expanded its logistical base with a second base in Telford, to answer calls to Shropshire more readily.
In October 2012, our members were training in water rescue skills near Machynlleth when the April Jones search became a major incident. Our members were amongst the first to offer their skills in the search, which went on to become the biggest deployment of UKSAR teams in the UK.
2013 Like the RNLI we were using phone pagers for callouts. Took part in Operation ISIS, the first ever multi-national Lowland SAR exercise and went on full water assets standby for Hereford and Worcester Fire Service when they were on strike. We opened a storage unit, based in Blackpole, Worcester to enable faster call outs in the south. Gained a Telford and Wrekin Grant to provide a new rescue boat.
2014. In January we answered a DEFRA deployment for 2 crews to Taunton in Somerset.
A Land Rover discovery was donated to the charity by Stratstone in Wolverhampton and in February we worked alongside the Fire Service in Hereford (HWFRS) with flooding response. There was also a Community Volunteers Emergency Committee deployment. In March we were put on standby to cover for further HWFRS strike action.
Later in the year a large van was donated to be used as our Incident Command Unit.
2015 brought a Dept of Transport Inshore Lifeboat Scheme grant for the purchase of 3 boats and all equipment to enable our full participation in flood response. The team was growing and a 3-5 year business plan and strategy was put in place
2016 saw the birth of our Kayak Team, the development of team branding and a marketing plan. Our focus for recruitment shifted to us being a charity which raises funds in order to train and equip a voluntary rescue team, rather than us being a rescue team which needs to fundraise. This is a subtle difference, true to this day. One which it is important for all members to realise. No fundraising = no team.
In October 2016 the team were involved in a multi-agency “disaster response” exercise in the Ironbridge Gorge. Exercise SIMUL was designed to test the response capability of all the emergency services working together.
This couple of years saw annual call outs increase from 26 to 48 and the team was growing rapidly, we outgrew our base in Shifnal and moved to larger premises in Bridgnorth, hosted by Classic Motor Cars. To support this growth a new approach to training was developed, involving on-line modules alongside the traditional face to face sessions. Over the next few years team membership was to grow from 40-80+.
Two significant multi-day searches and recoveries at this time resulted in appreciative family members becoming Ambassadors for the team and driving forces in the “Home and Dry” River Safety Campaign:
Kirsty Walsh in Shrewsbury, who lost her husband Shane “to the river” in 2017, has worked tirelessly to improve river safety in the town centre and has been a constant support to the team. Working in her own time and joining us on our River Patrols at Christmas.
Vikki and Ian Jones have created The Tom Jones In Memorium Fund: This fund is in memory of their son, a young student, Tom ‘Jonah’ Jones, who tragically drowned in 2018. It raises money for community sports groups in Worcestershire. Alongside this they champion our annual Tom Jones Memorial Football Tournament for young people.
Covid was a testing time for the team. We maintained operational status across the Lockdown restrictions with 71 incidents and more than 5775 hours logged in the period.
February 2021 signalled the signing of an agreement with 4 MERCIAN Army Reserve Centre in Kidderminster to allow the use of facilities as a water resources storage depot to allow us quicker response times in the south of our region.
In 2021 we also received grants from the Aviva and the National Lottery Community Funds to purchase and run an internet-based specialist planning system called Sarsys. Gone were the days of paper maps, coloured pens and pairs of compasses, alongside 4 volumes of search statistics! Now we can use laptops, mobile phones, keep detailed logs and quickly share information with the Police.
In 2022 The Team received the Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service (the MBE for Charities), and 31 Team members were recognised, for 5+ years voluntary service for search and rescue, with the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee Medal.
As the organisation grew, it became more complicated to run and a new structure was implemented with the Board of Trustees overseeing the charity, the Operational Management Team dealing with the practical operations on land, water and air and the Charity Management Team looking after keeping the charity healthy; fundraising, structural issues, mental health concerns, compliance, GDPR, etc.
In 2024, Team members were honoured with the award of the King’s Coronation Medal for services to search and rescue.
A short film was made for us, as a donation, by Big Button TV. “The Tom Jones’ Story” won an EVCOM Silver Award for best film in a digital campaign at ceremony in London in December 2024 and has been shortlisted for a Royal Television Society Award in 2025.
2025 has been the busiest year to date with 59 incidents recorded by September: 31 searches, 17 rescues, 10 mutual aid operations with neighbouring SAR teams and 1 weather related (flood) event.
And whilst there is still no dedicated West Midlands Search team things are going full-circle as we have recently signed a Memorandum of Understanding to operate at the behest of West Midland Police in their area.
The costs of leasing and running our main depot were increasing and the Shropshire Fire and Rescue Service stepped in with the offer of a new home at the fire station in Tweedale, Telford at minimal cost.
This year also saw operational agreements being signed with West Midlands Police and West Midlands Ambulance Service, to govern our increasing call outs by these organisations, particularly in the hillier parts of our “patch”.
We currently run 5 emergency vehicles to support Foot Teams, Swift Water Rescue Teams, a Kayak Team, a Sub-Surface (Sonar and ROV) Search Team, a Drone Team, and a Quad-Bike Team. We are proud to be part of Lowland Rescue “From Hill to High Water”
The vast majority of searches that the team have been involved in over the years are incidents which cannot be made public due to the vulnerable nature of the people involved, you will only hear the details of what we do if they are in the public domain. More details can be found on THIS page.