Rescue comprises responsive operations that usually involve the saving of life, removal from danger, liberation from restraint, or the urgent treatment of injuries after an incident. It may be facilitated by a range of tools and equipment necessary to deal with the specific circumstances.
Rescues may be necessary in a wide range of circumstances and environments, and specialised procedures have been developed for many of these. A rescue may also be performed on an ad hoc basis by the people who are available on site, using equipment available on site or assembled from available materials, particularly when the rescue is urgent or it is unlikely that specialist assistance will be available within a reasonable time. First aid medical attention is often closely associated with rescue, and may be a necessary part of a rescue.
Equipment used might include search and rescue dogs, mounted search and rescue horses, helicopters, the "jaws of life", and other hydraulic cutting and spreading tools used to extricate occupants from wrecked vehicles. Rescue operations may be supported by rescue vehicles operated by rescue squads.
Searches are often associated with rescues when persons are missing and likely to be in danger.
Body recovery is also closely associated with rescue operations, and may be subject to different legal constraints. Occupational safety and health legislation may be waived for rescue operations where there is a realistic probability of saving a life, but not for body recovery.
Interspecies rescue can occur when people rescue animals, when animals are part of a rescue team, and less often, when animals rescue people on their own initiative.
Self-rescue is the process of getting out of an emergency situation by one's own efforts as an individual or a group.
Merriam-Webster defines rescue as to free from confinement, danger, or evil, including to forcibly take someone or something from custody or relieve them from attack.[1] Rescue also implies that the danger is imminent and the action is generally prompt or vigorous.[2]
Circumstances that lead to the necessity for rescue can develop due to bad luck, when the events were not foreseeable, duty, where there is known risk, but the person is legally or ethically obliged to take the risk, through voluntary assumption of reasonable risk in the pursuit of profit, knowledge, entertainment or other perceived reward, ignorance of risk foreseeable by a well informed person, denial of obvious risk, or intentional exposure to obvious risk.
See also: Rule of Rescue. It is a common belief that one has a duty to rescue other people from serious and imminent danger when the risk and cost to oneself is low. This duty is not easily explained as part of a broader consequentialist requirement to prevent harm, nor is it a duty of social justice owed between citizens as part of a social contract for mutual protection. It is rather a duty of justice in its own right that is based on the direct encounter between the rescuer and the persons in danger, which limits its scope. The situation may be complicated when there are more than one person in a position to contribute towards rescue efforts, and the responsibility is diffused amongst the group until it has been fairly allocated among those present, at which stage justice requires each to discharge their own share, though it would be considered a humanitarian duty to compensate for inadequate response by other persons for whatever reason.[3]
As a general rule, a higher level of risk may be acceptable for actions more likely to result in successful rescue of a larger number of people, or of a person or persons of higher value to the rescuer.
Laws relating to rescue operations may constrain the activities of the rescuers by limiting the level of risk they may be exposed to under the direction of an employer (occupational safety legislation). The level of risk a competent person may voluntarily expose themself to may be significantly higher.
Liability for compensation for loss or injury during a rescue is a complex matter.
Some rescue operations require a high degree of competence and are usually performed by specialist rescue squads with appropriate training, either independent or part of larger organizations such as fire, police, military, first aid, or ambulance services. In the U.S., they are usually staffed by medically trained personnel as NFPA regulations require it.
Other rescues can be performed by any able bodied person who happens to be available at the time, using tools and equipment as may be available. There may be legal protection for non-specialist persons performing rescues for which they are not technically qualified in an emergency, in case they accidentally harm anyone or damage or trespass on property while attempting an apparently urgent rescue. Laws will vary depending on jurisdiction.
Special situations involving rescue, and specialised rescue equipment, include the following topics:
Rescue equipment can be any equipment used for the purpose of rescue, but particularly equipment designed, manufactured, and marketed for rescue applications. Ropes and special equipment may be used to reach and remove living people and animals from difficult locations. Some equipment may be carried by people or vehicles intended to facilitate rescue if an incident occurs. This is usually a transponder to broadcast a distress signal allowing the location to be established.
See also: Rescue (disambiguation). Rescue is a potent theme in human psychology, both from mortal perils and moral perils, and is often treated in fiction, with the rescue of a damsel in distress being a notable trope. Psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud introduced the concept of "rescue fantasies" by men pursuing "fallen women" in his 1910 work "A Special Type of Choice of Object Made by Men";[5] Freud's insight into this aspect of male psychology might retain merit, though his proposed Oedipus complex used to frame this concept is no longer in vogue. Within the practice of psychoanalysis, the term has taken on the additional sense concerning therapists' desire to 'rescue' their clients.[6]
Historically, rescue could refer to an act of property seizure in service of an unpaid debt. For example, there is record of a countryman living in the vicinity of present-day Wythenshawe being prosecuted in a local court for "making rescue" of a pig which had been seized as a distress for non-payment of money owed.