By: Blonde Two
I was awake in the night last night trying to decide whether or not it was appropriate to mention yesterday’s tragedy at Haytor in a blog post. In the end, it just seemed wrong to ignore it. Dartmoor is a place that many of us love and a place where many people experience deep joy and much needed relaxation but it also has its moments of great sorrow.
As I am sure many of you did, I read the story with horror and sympathy for the families of those who died. But what struck me immediately after that was the long list of emergency services attending. We are very lucky to have such a high level of emergency support in this country and even luckier in Devon to have the Devon Air Ambulance and Dartmoor Rescue as back up.
The plain truth is that, because of the commitment of these men and women (there are lots of women), we know that someone will arrive to help when we need them to. In our homes, out on the sea or in the middle of nowhere – someone will come to sort the situation out. There isn’t an easy way to explain how this feels. When I broke my ankle mid Dartmoor a few years ago, it was a frightening, painful and potentially dangerous situation. The sense of relief and being able to “let go” when the Air Ambulance arrived had almost physical manifestations, not just for me but for those who were helping (including Blonde One).
Since my rescue, I have a personal rule that I will never go past an Air Ambulance donation box without putting some money in. As I rarely seem to have change, this has led to a few notes shaped donations in the past. It will take me a long time to repay the financial cost and I can’t repay the skill and professionalism of the team but it will make a little difference. Cafe and pub visits on Dartmoor have recently become even more expensive as since Blonde One and I have made friends with the Dartmoor Rescue chaps (and chapesses) at Ashburton, I feel obliged to put money in their box too.
Blonde One recently told my donation box story to a friend who doesn’t know me. This lovely lady liked the idea and said that she would donate every time as well. Feel free to join us on this quest Blondees and Blondettes – together we can give a little something back and make sure that next time someone needs to know that help is coming, they can be sure that it will be.
P.S. A Blonde date for your diary. Saturday 21st September – we are planning a Dartmoor Blonde Bimble to raise a bit of money for Dartmoor Rescue. Come and meet the Two Blondes and join in the fun!
Ummmm that’s my birthday – you can’t do it then!!!!
You girls are so fussy. How about you tell me some dates you can do in September and we will see if Blonde Bimbling can be moved!
I think if we start that we may never get a date!!!!!!!! I’m sure a blonde birthday bimble would be a great way to spend the day!!! I may even bring cake!!!
Hooray now if Ju can adjust her DofE routes a bit …
Sorry, can’t bimble that weekend-Silver Assessed on Exmoor!
As you know hubby does “his bit” for the RNLI and his baptism of fire involved picking up someone who had just jumped off Berry Head and tried desperately to resuscitate them before the sad, inevitable happened. I think with the likes of the Dartmoor Search and Rescue, RNLI, Coastguard Teams you have to remember that this wonderful people do this all for free and have to deal with the shocking emotional consequences of, sadly, many of their callouts, yesterdays tragic examples being a prime example. Obviously the impact on all emergency services involved will be severe, but when you look at the voluntary sector, they have to deal with a horrific incident and then return to the “day job”. I have so much respect for these guys and gals – I’ve often considered volunteering for an emergency service, but as a pretty emotional person I’m not sure how well I could deal with this aspect of what they do. All the more reason for supporting them all in a financial capacity. Obviously we do a lot for the RNLI, I do the Devon Air Ambulance lottery every month, and through the promotion of the wonderful Dartmoor Search and Rescue through yourselves, I now donate to them as and when I can. I’m sure there are others who have donated as well through the work that the TwoBlondes have done in raising awareness of the work the rescue teams do. So keep up the good work girls!
I’d like to play too – if I’m not in the Lakes by then.
For many years I was a member of the Radio Amateur’s Emergency Network and helped man innumerable walks, bike rides and youth night exercises; sadly, down here it appears to be redundant in my area; in all that time, I only had one genuine callout, which involved a late night dash to Peterborough to help provide communications when a vital paging system failed. The local lads and lassies had kept it up for a whole week before they called in help from further away; amateurs responded from as far away as Cornwall! I did nothing – the systems came back online at 2 a.m. on the night I was there; but one of our lads had to have counselling after some of the things he saw in the hospital. It must be dreadful to face those things day after day, year after year.