THE number of people needing to be rescued by specially trained teams of the Majorcan Fire Service and Guardia Civil has shot up over the past two years.
At the end of last year, rescue services reported they had been called out on 142 occasions, many more than in 2007 and 2006 when 88 and 66 calls for help were received respectively. From January to July of 2008, 78 rescues took place and 73 were carried out during the same period this year. Majorcan Fire Service Rescue Group Coordinator, Bernat Franco, said yesterday that the majority of operations this year have been carried out in the Tramuntana mountains but that there were also some in the region of Arta. His group works in collaboration with their counterparts in the Guardia Civil and have a helicopter unit at their disposal.