PRESS RELEASE FROM NORTH DARTMOOR SEARCH AND RESCUE TEAM

20 April 2026

Ada: Immortalised in Mountain Rescue England and Wales

After 32 years of operational service within Mountain Rescue England and Wales (“MREW”), split between Langdale Ambleside Mountain Rescue Team and North Dartmoor Search and Rescue Team (“NDSART”).

Ada, or Dart 51, her call sign assigned during her operational service with NDSART, will be immortalised in MREW as she welcomes her new home at the Dunsfold Collection in Surrey, a registered charity that is dedicated to the preservation of Land Rover history and that manages the largest Land Rover museum in the UK.

As part of this collection, Ada will remain in her Mountain Rescue livery and continue to showcase the extraordinary work volunteers within MREW do – Risking their own lives and dedicating hundreds of hours each year to search and rescue those in need in the outdoors.

On Sunday, 8 March 2026, Ada made her final journey with her Mountain Rescue team and made the long journey from Okehampton to Dunsfold.

Dunsfold founding trustee and museum curator, Philip Bashall, was on hand to welcome Ada to the collection, and commented: “We are delighted to welcome this very special Defender to Dunsfold, and it’s wonderful to see another historically important Land Rover joining the Collection, especially one that has spent its entire life supporting the incredible volunteers in two of the country’s Mountain Rescue teams.”

During Ada’s sixteen years of service with NDSART, she was involved in over 400 callouts and has saved countless lives and helped make people’s days who were bad, a little bit better. Below are some of Ada’s most notable callouts and events over the years.

February 2021 – Exeter and February 2024 – Plymouth

Supported the evacuations by transporting resources and team members to locations across the cities where unexploded World War II devices were discovered in Exeter, 2021 and Plymouth, 2024.

1 March 2018 ‘the Beast from the East’

A rare ‘red’ weather warning, centred on Okehampton, preceded a significant, sudden snowfall. The strong wind picked up the fine snow, and in relatively few minutes it drifted and filled the A386 road, in places to over 1.5 m deep.

The team was called in the evening to locate people trapped in their cars and extract them to an emergency rest centre set up in the local Secondary School.  Through the night, teams checked on vehicles and dug to get access to open doors and many tens of adults, children and pets were rescued, including a litter of puppies.  The next day, after only an hour or two of sleep, the team was called to support the ambulance service, which struggled to access the area.  The team was stood down in the evening, but not before responding to a 999 call for a suspected heart attack.

26 Dec 2019

A lone walker had become disoriented and lost whilst having a Boxing Day walk. When night fell, they called 999 and reported that they were cold but unharmed at the top of a hill next to a small building. There are small buildings on many of the hills in the area, associated with the military firing range, so a particularly large number of team members were deployed in thick fog and a cold wind to check each of them in both teams’ Land Rovers.

The casualty was located at the top of Steeperton Tor and extracted in a warm Land Rover to their family at the rendezvous point. They were very grateful and apologetic until several members explained that they had been stuck indoors with their family/in-laws for two days, and we’re happy to have an excuse to go outside!

30 Sept 2020

The team was deployed to search for a group that had found themselves in the middle of the notorious bog of Raybarrow Pool. They had tried to find a way out but kept getting more and more stuck.

Ada transported team members with local knowledge and equipment to help the callers to safety.

8 May 2022, 29 Apr 2023 – Photos of Ada supporting the Ten Tors event https://www.tentors.org.uk/

21 June 2022

A walker as part of an organised group had sustained an ankle injury on a narrow path at the side of Meldon reservoir. Ada conveyed team members and equipment to a point within a few hundred metres of the casualty. The casualty was treated by the Team’s Remote Rescue Medical Technicians and then conveyed to the Land Rover and taken to the rendezvous point to be taken to the hospital.

27 Feb 2024

Exercise where a simulated casualty was missing on Dartmoor above Lydford: they were found with a simulated lower leg injury and transported back to the rendezvous point at the Fox and Hounds pub car park. This reflects similar callouts.

6 Jul 2021

The team was called to respond to support the British Army with evacuating a soldier who had sustained a significant knee injury and was in a challenging location halfway down a steep slope.  In battle conditions, the army would have managed this themselves, but they wanted specialist support to extract the soldier without worsening the injury. Ada took a team, including a Remote Rescue Medical Technician, who assessed and treated the casualty and packaged them for transport. Meanwhile, our specialist Rope Rescue Technicians set up a system to haul the soldier, on a stretcher, up the steep slope, and they were later carried to a Land Rover at the end of a track before being driven back to meet an ambulance at the Fox and Hounds car park.

16 November 2024

South Western Ambulance Service asked us to respond to a female fell runner with an ankle injury, near Sourton Tor. Our team located the casualty, gave pain relief and then carried her to Ada, waiting on a track around 1km away from the casualty site. Ada then transported the casualty back to the ambulance waiting at the Fox and Hounds car park.

18 June 2024: The team was called to support the neighbouring Dartmoor Search and Rescue Team – Tavistock with the extraction of a horse rider who sustained injuries when they fell from their horse near Doe Tor. Team members were transported by Ada to the nearest accessible point, then assisted with the long stretcher carry to an Ambulance Service off-road vehicle.

23 March 2025: Ada was asked to join a parade of Series 1s from the Series 1 club before they started a day out on Dartmoor.

20 May 2025: Ada is ready for deployment at the team’s base – the oldest front-line emergency vehicle in the country!

22 August 2025: The team was called to search for a lost walker who had called for help. They knew their approximate location, so Ada took a team to locate them. The walker was found safe and well, although cold, and was walked to Ada at the end of a track (formerly a peat tramway), and driven the 20-30 minutes off-road back to the Fox and Hounds car park.