London Search and Rescue puts out a call for new volunteers

Kicking off the new year, the London Search and Rescue (LSAR) Team is putting out a call for new recruits.

The volunteer-based organization has helped police and OPP locate missing people for the last 20 years. The LSAR assists investigators within a 150-kilometre radius of London to find missing people, such as those with Alzheimer’s and dementia, as well as “despondent individuals, children, people in crisis and persons with mental challenges.”

“There’s a lot of demands on police today,” said Jamie Walls, LSAR commander. “When a search comes along, it requires a lot of sudden person power and they can’t simply pull everybody off the streets to do that. That’s where an organization like London Search and Rescue comes in.”

“We can hit the ground very quickly for them wherever they want to deploy us. They contact our call coordinator, who then essentially sends a call out to our 70 members,” he said.

Walls said that they’re looking for 30 new searchers to train with the organization.

According to their website, members of LSAR are trained in “Standard First Aid, Basic and Advanced Search and Rescue, evidence handling, orienteering, search patterns, missing person behaviour, psychology of survival, man tracking and many other areas of expertise to effectively assist on searches.”

Walls said the training, which is spread across a couple of weekends, is a 40-to-50-hour course.

LSAR volunteers are on call 24/7, requiring members to search in all weather conditions during all seasons.

Walls said that search and rescue teams don’t typically receive any funding, explaining how LSAR fundraises to keep the team operating and ready for action.

“We’ve had some assistance in funding from the London Community Foundation and the Lawson Foundation, who are helping us to provide uniforms to these 30 new members,” he said.

Interested volunteers are asked to fill out the LSAR form by Jan. 22.

Visit the LSAR website for more information.

— with files from Global News’ Sawyer Bogdan.