CAVE and mine lifesavers have a newly equipped rescue trailer, thanks to £3,500 of backing from a Heritage Lottery-funded scheme.

The Gloucestershire Cave Rescue Group (GCRG) will station the trailer at its Cinderford base and will use it in all cave and mine rescue incidents across the county and parts of the Thames Valley.

The Foresters’ Forest Landscape Partnership has helped fund the new equipment, and GCRG chairman Paul Taylor, said: “The trailer project has been something we have been working towards for some time, and the provision of the grant has enabled the group to bring it to completion sooner than planned. It will play a significant part in improving our overall response.”

It carries rescue equipment such as stretchers, casualty care equipment, rigging and communications kit, and has a fully functional control room to manage incidents from.

The mobile, pop-up, emergency control centre will help speed up the response to dangerous situations, such as when an injured young woman was rescued from rising water at Otter Hole cave near the mouth of the River Wye in 2003.

It quickly transforms into an emergency communications centre with state-of-the-art, technology that includes the latest web-based SARCALL call out system and a communications system that allows the controllers to send text messages through rock.

Mr Taylor, who has been caving for 50 years, added: “In the last year the group have been called out to two rescues across the Forest, and the potential for incidents is always there. It is essential that the group has the manpower and equipment to respond when required.

“Unlike the statutory emergency services, the cave rescue group is made up of volunteers who respond when required from the four corners of the county and beyond.

“Although this response is always done as quickly as possible, having this trailer fully loaded and equipped ready to go will speed up the deployment to the incident.”

Rich Daniels, chairman of the Royal Forest of Dean Freeminers Association, said: “The rescue service provides the mining community of the Forest Of Dean with an invaluable first response rescue facility for our underground working.

“The valuable support of the Heritage Lottery Fund through the Foresters’ Forest Landscape Partnership Programme has enabled the service to become even more effective and we are most grateful.”

GCRG was formed in 1964 and currently has 100 volunteers drawn from local caving clubs.

The Foresters’ Forest is a £2.5m Heritage Lottery Funded Landscape Partnership Programme to raise awareness and participation in the built, natural and cultural heritage in the Forest of Dean. The programme consists of 38 exciting projects being delivered by 32 partner organisations and community groups.