Cost of mountain Rescue??Who pays?

burly

After the recent events on Lugnaquilla and the McGillicuddies, it got me thinking. Who pays for a mountain rescue call?
If you are in trouble, and you call the rescue team, do you have to pay for the rescue? Are they state funded in some way?
It seems like a deterrent, like if you knew it was going to cost thousands, you might risk going on even if you were lost to avoid paying.

Anyone know the procedure?

Alun

All MRT's in Ireland are voluntary organisations and receive no state funding as far as I am aware. More often than not, especially for the larger rescues, the Gardai, Ambulance Service and the Coast Guard rescue helicopter are involved, which you and I pay for out of our taxes.

I'd urge anybody who's a regular hillwalker to make a voluntary donation to one of the local MRT's, either personally or through your club. The group I walk with hold an annual collection amongst our members for the Glen of Imaal MRT for example.

I'm sure Gil_Dub (who's with the Dublin and Wicklow MRT) will be along real soon to give a more detailed breakdown of the situation.

NathanKingerlee

I don't think people should be deterred from either going into the outdoors or asking for help if they really need it. What I think should be encouraged is having the right gear and expertise and knowing where your own personal safe limits are.

ednwireland

our club always donates money to the local mrt i always donate a good amount know quite a lot of people in the mrt was on call myself when they first started but they are all volunteers i dont think they get money from the gov. just read the donegal mrt calendar it cost 65000 to run last year and they got 19% from local and national gov. but then they only got 30 calls last year.

http://www.donegalmrt.ie/

WLPD

NathanKingerlee wrote: »

I don't think people should be deterred from either going into the outdoors or asking for help if they really need it. What I think should be encouraged is having the right gear and expertise and knowing where your own personal safe limits are.

+1

fergalr

burly wrote: »

After the recent events on Lugnaquilla and the McGillicuddies, it got me thinking. Who pays for a mountain rescue call?
If you are in trouble, and you call the rescue team, do you have to pay for the rescue? Are they state funded in some way?
It seems like a deterrent, like if you knew it was going to cost thousands, you might risk going on even if you were lost to avoid paying.

Anyone know the procedure?

I'm not involved in mountain rescue; I do some hillwalking, and it's from that perspective I'm posting. There was a lot of talk about this sort of thing on forums like 'After Hours' around the time; didn't comment on it there, but I have some thoughts on this topic which I hope you don't mind me posting here, even if it's not directly answering your questions.


You don't seem to be saying whether you think deterring people from calling mountain rescue is a good or bad thing, so I won't make assumptions.

I'd like to say that I think not having to pay for rescue is a very good thing.


By way of analogy, imagine someone has an urgent medical condition - for the sake of argument, brought on because they were overweight, and smoked, and didn't exercise enough. Let's say they arrive in Galway hospital, and the best medical option is an immediate airlift to Dublin.

Should they be asked to pay for the helicopter (expensive) and let weigh up their survival chances against the cost of the trip, in their traumatised state?

In general, as a society, we pay for their airlift, and their emergency treatment. We all pay our taxes, as a sort of insurance, in case something bad like that happens to us.


A lot of people say that it's a bit different for mountain rescue, because the rescuee is voluntary taking an unnecessary risk when they go into the hills. But statistically, I'd say smokers, and motorcyclists, and sedentary people also take unnecessary risks - and I wouldn't like to even start going into what those medical bills add up to - so it might be a bit inconsistent to just charge hillwalkers.


Also, if one is to argue that having to pay for rescue would provide a beneficial effect, you'd need to do a proper analysis of the total cost to society of the occasional mountain rescue (possibly involving expensive helicopter etc), vs. the cost to society of the decreased levels of outdoor activity, in long term health bills, personal and emotion well-being and so on.


It might also be worth mentioning, that if you did charge people for rescue, pretty quickly a market for insurance would emerge, and thus would probably remove most of the supposed incentive.
I found it interesting to note that BMC insurance cover for trekking, Europe wide, for a full year (no limit on days), costs about 200£ - and that covers glacier crossings and stuff like that. It's probably the more adventurous subset of walkers that are buying that insurance too, thus pushing up the premiums, and it's still not a huge amount of money.

You can't just look at the cost of an individual incident, and think 'wow, thats a big bill, you have to look at the total cost/benefit scenario, and look at the percentage of people that go out and are fortunate to not need a rescue, too.


You've also got to consider how much a human life is worth. If you did charge for rescue, and that meant that 10 people didn't call the for the rescue, and survived, saving, for example (at 10k per rescue) 100,000euro, but the 11th person didn't call for the rescue, and died, would it be worth it? What if the figures were 100:1? I don't want to come across as a complete idealist, but I'd rather live in a society that decides it's better to not risk charging for rescue.


I accept this is a complex issue. You could also say that the potential cost might deter people from going out on that particularly windy day; but I would think the vast majority of people make a safety decision at the start of the day anyway, and will only go out if they think it's *reasonably* safe. I think the incentive effect of charging for rescue would only really stop people, particularly poorer people, from calling for rescue after something unforeseen has gone wrong, which is when they really need help. Do you really want these people, who need assistance due to unforeseen consequences, to have to weigh up the financial costs?


Going out in the hills is generally riskier than staying at home. (Maybe not long term due to health - but on any given day). At the same time, everyone I've met takes their safety seriously, and I'd say the vast majority of hillwalkers would not want to call for rescue in case they really need it, which is generally in a circumstance they wouldn't have foreseen anyway; just out of consideration for the rescuers, if nothing else. You mentioned the incident on Lug - I don't know the people involved, but from what little I read, they really came across like that.

I don't think there's any real benefit, in terms of individual safety, in terms of overall finances, or in terms of societal well being, to charge for rescue; and I see several ways it could cause harm.


Incidentally, I think rescue services like mountain rescue and lifeboats should be properly funded by the state.
The organisations are great for the work they do, but their volunteering is providing a service to the rest of us that we should really be paying for.

Just my .02 - hope haven't crossed anyone involved in rescue, that has a more informed opinion on these issues!

burly

My own position and reason for starting this thread is that i totally agree that the cost of mountain rescue should be state funded.
The MRT teams around the country are constantly on call, and are required to go out in all weather conditions and i think it is unfair that they have to rely on donations etc.

Some coverage of the recent rescue on Lug annoyed me, there was almost an air of 'they cost us money' about the whole thing, as if that was the primary concern. I'm no mountaineer, but I suspect calling in the rescue was the last thing they wanted, and I also suspect that a lot of the complaints were coming from those whose only exercise is punching in the number of Joe Duffy on the phone.

Donny5

Deleted User wrote: »

Some coverage of the recent rescue on Lug annoyed me, there was almost an air of 'they cost us money' about the whole thing, as if that was the primary concern. I'm no mountaineer, but I suspect calling in the rescue was the last thing they wanted, and I also suspect that a lot of the complaints were coming from those whose only exercise is punching in the number of Joe Duffy on the phone.

I got that feeling too. The Mountain Rescue teams are great value, and the biggest cost paid is by the volunteers in time and lost working hours. I agree it should be a donation and state-funded service, as that's working.

Evil Phil

From reading the reports on climbing.ie and being aware of the two guys involved they aren't what you'd called novice climbers, not that it makes a difference, but it does show that it can happen to anybody. I think the MRT did a great job that day and night and really showed their dedication to saving lives.

Myself I've only ever used the words 'Do you want me to call Mountain Rescue?' once (with meaning) fortunately it wasn't neccessary and we took care of ourselves but all the same it was good to know they're there.

Evil Phil

Evil Phil wrote: »

Myself I've only ever used the words 'Do you want me to call Mountain Rescue?' once (with meaning) fortunately it wasn't neccessary and we took care of ourselves but all the same it was good to know they're there.

I live about half a mile outside a town, up a hill, and I use that line every night I walk home drunk!