One of the founding members of SARDA Scotland is calling for anyone who has been saved by their dogs to get in touch.
The highly trained canines and their handlers assist the police and mountain rescue teams in searching for buried avalanche victims and people missing in the hills.
And Dr Catherine MacLeod, 83, is particularly keen to trace a man she was involved in saving in a rescue at Glencoe in Lochaber in 1965 – the year she and her then husband Hamish MacInnes were instrumental in setting up SARDA.
Dr MacLeod, who has homes at Kinlochleven and Portknockie in Moray, said there were many people alive today who would not have been if they had not been found by SARDA dogs.
And she pointed out that members of the association rarely got hear about what happened after their part in the rescue.
Dr MacLeod said their Alsatian, called Rangi, rescued 19-year-old Chris Booth who went missing after he joined in with the rescue of a woman who had been injured while climbing near the summit of 2,715ft An t-Sron.
She said: “Hamish was following the rescue team when Rangi suddenly wanted to go in a different direction.
“He followed the dog and they found Chris Booth, who had a head injury where he had slipped and fallen into a deep gully that we certainly wouldn’t have been looking for him in.
“It would be very interesting to hear from him and anyone else who has been rescued by SARDA dogs.”
SARDA Scotland can be contacted via the association’s website at www.sarda-scotland.org
