The British Red Cross in Somerset has launched a campaign to recruit hundreds of volunteers willing to drop everything during a major emergency to help people in crisis in their own community.

When disaster hits, ‘Community Reserve Volunteers’ will form a practical taskforce, working as a team to do anything from filling sandbags to sorting food for their community.

It is hoped the new teams will be able to provide valuable help if emergencies like the extensive flooding on the Somerset Levels in 2014 were ever to be repeated. It only takes ten minutes to sign up, and volunteers will then be called out by text when they’re needed.

Janey Pointing, from Bridgwater, has already signed up. She was inspired to do so after watching the huge community response to the Grenfell Tower fire in June, and thinks the new initiative is a great way for people to offer their kindness, skills and local knowledge when something happens on their doorstep.

Janey said: “I watched the overwhelming response to Grenfell Tower on the news, and knew if anything like that ever happened close to me I’d want to help.

“I also remember chatting to a man who was caught up in the Boxing Day Tsunami and he explained, on arriving back in the UK, how he was met at the airport by volunteers from the Red Cross. He described how they gave him clothes and supported him just at a time when he needed it the most. His account moved me to tears.

“Signing up to become a community reserve volunteer seems like a good thing to do. If anything happened here in Somerset, I’d like to be able to help in some small way.”

Simon Lewis, head of Crisis Response for the Red Cross, said: “We’ve seen through the sad events of this year, including the Manchester Arena and London Bridge attacks and the Grenfell Tower tragedy, the extraordinary levels of compassion shown by ordinary people from local communities when a crisis hits. It shows you don’t need special skills to help others. Small acts of kindness and coming together as a team can make a huge difference.

“This project is a way of harnessing the goodwill and kindness of the public for future emergencies, by signing people up in advance. We recognise people have busy lives and can’t always commit to volunteering all year round. We would only call upon people at times of major local crisis, which hopefully won’t happen often, but when they do, and extra help is needed, people will have the opportunity to make a big difference. There are many different ways of helping your community, but this is a new one.”

People can sign up in ten minutes online at: www.redcross.org.uk/reserves by watching a short video, answering some quick questions and registering their details. Volunteers must be over eighteen, have a mobile phone and be prepared to carry out practical tasks during an emergency.