Story: Search and rescue

L. D. (Bill) Bridge, of the Tararua Tramping Club, helped frame the first rules for mountain searches in 1933, and was the Federated Mountain Clubs’ nominee to the national search and rescue committee in 1949. In 1964 he volunteered to train police squads, a task at which he excelled. When he died suddenly during a search and rescue exercise in 1973, his body had to be carried out of the bush by men he had trained.