Drones – The SAR Monitor

Surrey SAR flying drones illegally…..confirmed

Further to our previous post when SCC leaked a document to the Armed Forces and RNLI about Surrey SAR flying drones illegally we now see that an article was published in the press.

It can be read here… https://www.getsurrey.co.uk/news/surrey-news/surrey-search-rescue-volunteers-flew-18281105

The Surrey Police response was “Following the investigation, the decision was made, in conjunction with advice provided by the Civil Aviation Authority, that it was proportionate to deal with these matters as a point of learning, allowing appropriate practice and process change to ensure that Surrey Search and Rescue did not commit any further breaches.”…

Of note is the response from James Rossell when he says “The matters were rightly investigated by the police, and separately the police found that there was either no evidence that drones were flown outside of the law, or that no offence has been committed. In response to a single incident, additional training was recommended by the police and we accepted those findings. No further action was taken against the drone operators or the charity.“

Yet again Mr Rosssell can’t be honest and open about what happened. It is quite clear that there were Air Navigation Order offences as Seamus Kearns flew in congested areas without a PFCO and the police dealt with this as words of advice so that Surrey SAR could learn from their mistakes. With attitudes like this fool has is it any wonder that team members and people on other teams or the emergency services have no respect for him and really don’t like him.

It is also noted “We ensure that safety is a key priority when we carry out searches to save lives and rescue people in danger.“….hmmmm I’m sure not you a have real grip on what safety is or have a grip on health and safety. Gavin becoming hypothermic and hospitalised after a Surrey SAR training session in a lake and lets not forget that James Turnbull wrote “we broke Buzz” when he was joking about Susan having her ankle broken on another water training session. Safety isn’t a joke Mr Turnbull.

SurSAR drones being flown illegally?

Well well well. Thanks to someone in Surrey County Council leaking this document and sending it to the Armed Forces and other high profile organisations including the RNLI, it appears that SurSAR have indeed been flying drones illegally and lends weight to the fact that people in SFRS do not like or trust SurSAR. At least more organisations are aware of the risk of using SurSAR.

It is no surprise to us to see James Rossell and Seamus Kearns mentioned as the ones flying illegally and dangerously. Let’s not forget we are supposed to “trust the trustees”. How can we when they are putting lives at risk whether it be from ignoring intelligence during searches, to bodged water rescue deployments, to driving dangerously on blue lights and now to flying drones dangerously.

Surrey Police and Surrey Fire and Rescue Service really need to demand changes at SurSAR by stopping using them until they clear out the dangerous, incompetent fools that are the “Trustees” and self appointed Operational Management Team.