The Mountain Rescue team, which is based in Marsden near Huddersfield, needed to replace their time-served 20-year-old Land Rover with a more modern, purpose-built vehicle and the Freemasons weighed in with a £30,000 grant to help them achieve that ambition.
Their plight had been identified by the Freemason’s Holme Valley Lodge, who succeeded in acquiring the significant grant from the Province of Yorkshire, West Riding’s Masonic Community Fund.
With the Freemason’s financial support, together with other donations, the Mountain Rescue team has been able to purchase an Isuzu Pick-up truck and have it specially adapted to become an emergency response vehicle.
James H Newman OBE, Provincial Grand Master of the Freemason’s Province of Yorkshire, West Riding, said:
I am incredibly proud that the generosity of our members from Lodges across all parts of Yorkshire enables us to support vital voluntary emergency response services like the Holme Valley Mountain Rescue team.
It is immensely satisfying for Freemasons to know that they are supporting a project that saves lives and assists people, who find themselves in difficult situations whilst enjoying themselves in Yorkshire’s amazing countryside.
The Mountain Rescue team’s David Honour said:
We have to cover an area of more than 1,000 square miles of open country and appropriate transport is essential to ensure our rescue teams can reach the people who are in difficulty as quickly as possible.
Our area contains a big variety of open country varying from craggy moorland cliffs to vast peat moors, waterfalls, rivers, and lakes so we really need a suitable vehicle to transport a huge range of equipment.
Thanks to the Freemason’s generosity we have been able to retire the Land Rover that we have been using since 2001 and buy a modern, purpose-built vehicle that has been converted for emergency response uses.
We are very grateful to them, and their support will enable us to continue saving lives and treating casualties.
The Holme Valley Mountain Rescue team answers approximately 70 calls for help each year and their new vehicle went straight into service after being delivered to their Marsden headquarters.
