The Rescue Team is a voluntary organisation and every Team member also has a job on campus. The Vice-Chancellor has written to the various managers of University departments, encouraging their support for the Team. The buildings range from domestic dwellings to highly complex research laboratories. The possible hazards could therefore range from a fire in a chip pan to a fire involving 50-gallon drums of flammable solvent, or perhaps a leakage of radioactive isotopes or toxic gas in one of the Science Buildings.
Potential hazards are far more than in many small towns.
Once the fire alarm sounds in a University building it can take the Fire Brigade up to twenty minutes, depending upon traffic and weather conditions, to arrive on campus. It could be within the first three to five minutes of the alarm sounding that, if expert assistance was not available, a life could be lost. The primary function of the 'Team' is to save life during those first few critical minutes of an incident should it be necessary. During working hours all Team members are in constant contact, by means of a UHF radio system, with the Security Office through whom emergency calls are automatically channelled. Once an 'alarm call' has been received by the Team they can be at the scene of an incident within the first two minutes of the alarm sounding in the building.