Joining the team: what we look for in new members

Twice a year, usually spring and autumn, we open applications for new team members. Every intake we get the same question: what are you actually looking for? The honest answer surprises people.

Fitness matters — but not the way you think

You do not need to be a fell runner. You need to be able to walk uphill for two hours carrying a share of a 20kg kit load, in the dark, in horizontal rain, and still be useful when you arrive. That is stamina and stubbornness more than speed. Plenty of our strongest members are in their fifties.

Hill experience is non-negotiable

We train navigation, rope work and casualty care from scratch. What we cannot train is judgement — the instinct for when a slope is about to become a problem, what a forecast actually means at 700 metres, how quickly a warm afternoon becomes a survival situation on the tops. That comes from years of walking these fells in all seasons. If you are not already out on the hill most weeks, start there, and come to us in a year or two.

Reliability beats brilliance

A callout at 2am on a Tuesday does not care that you have work in the morning. We are not asking anyone to attend everything — nobody does — but the team runs on people who turn up consistently, for the unglamorous stuff too: kit checks, vehicle washing, training nights in the rain when there has been no callout for weeks.

The selection year

Successful applicants join as trainees for a minimum of twelve months. You will shadow callouts (carrying, not treating), pass navigation and casualty care assessments, and get to know the patch — every gill, crag and bridleway of it. At the end, the full team votes. It sounds brutal; in practice, by then everyone already knows whether you belong, including you.

If that sounds like you, come and talk to us at a training night first. The kettle is always on.