Forty years of saving lives: Country SES unit celebrates milestone

Unit members Doug Wadley, Ian Vanderbeek and unit manager Andrew Sherriff all agreed that change and adaptation had been the main constants since it was founded in 1984.

"It's forever changing - the amount of change that would have happened in the 40 years would be unbelievable," Mr Sherriff said.

He has been the unit manager for five years after Mark Gillies stepped down in 2019 and the third unit manager in the history of the unit.

Mr Wadley's father was one of the original members of the unit in 1984, and has been a member since 2000, though he spent 15 years as a paramedic in New South Wales before joining again in 2019.

"Originally how it all began was one of the founding members ... used to have a panel beater shop and he had Porta Power gear for repairing crushed vehicles," Mr Wadley said.

"If there was a car accident in the area, the police would call around to his panel beater shop, grab him and the gear and then go off to wherever the car accident was.

"And that's how they performed the rescue; that's how it originally happened back in the day."

He said it was the local Lions Club that raised the money to purchase a trailer and some Porta Power rescue gear for the unit - and the rest is history.

Mr Sherriff said before a rescue unit was established, there was a big time lapse before help arrived.

"Before this happened on a local level, if you got trapped in your car on the highway out here you had to wait for someone to come from Launceston or Devonport," he said.

Mr Vanderbeek originally started with the NSW SES in 2011 and moved to Tasmania in 2019, where he joined the Meander Valley unit.

He said one of the biggest changes throughout the decades has been the technology and gear.

"There's always ongoing training around that technology," Mr Vanderbeek said.

"Probably the other biggest change is the sort of tools that we use nowadays - we used to have hydraulic [rescue tools], so when we got to a job we had to roll all those things out.

"Now, because these are battery operated, we literally can just take them out of the cradle and we can be straight in working on a job.

"There's no question that the unit has saved lives."

Mr Sherriff said over time, rescue equipment has to change alongside car manufacturing.

"The hydraulic equipment we had 25 years ago when I joined wouldn't cut through a late model car - it's not powerful enough," he said.

"They constantly have to make the gear more powerful because cars are getting stronger and stronger.

"We've got far superior equipment than they ever had - they had all hand operated hydraulic gear."

SES units are always looking for more volunteers and recruits, with training sessions typically held every second Thursday.

"They can come to training and see what we do and see if they're interested in what we do and whether they want to join up or not," Mr Sherriff said.

Meander Valley SES Unit is hosting an open day at the Deloraine Bowls Club on Saturday May 11, from 1 to 4pm.