Our Mission

Established in 1996, Sauvetage Bénévole Outaouais – Ottawa Volunteer Search and Rescue (SBO-OVSAR) is a federally incorporated, charitable, volunteer-based search and rescue organization serving the Outaouais and Eastern Ontario regions.

Our mission is to assist individuals and communities by providing quality search and rescue and search management services; public education programs to help people enjoy the outdoors safely; and assistance to communities during emergencies.

Your Donation Helps Us Save Lives 

Our capacity to respond to calls from a police service when people are lost or to assist municipalities when an emergency strikes is dependent on the personal contribution of our members and the support of the community.

Did you know that since 2010, SBO-OVSAR members have responded to 79 incidents, participated in 823 training exercises, offered over 105 outdoor safety programs and dedicated a total of 65,795 hours and more than $500,000 of their own funds to serve their community?

In addition to the contribution of our volunteers, we could not do what we do without fundraising and community partner support, which has allowed us to acquire a dedicated command post trailer and a truck to pull it, and team equipment such as GPSs, base and hand held radios, advanced first aid equipment, search management software and hardware.

As you know, technology is always changing so there is an ongoing need to maintain and update this equipment, to enhance our capacity and to support our members thus ensuring the team's readiness to respond in an effective manner to existing and new taskings from our partners agencies.

So your donation goes a long way to helping us achieve our mission and ultimately save lives.

Testimony

“How can one adequately express her thanks to a group of people dedicated to saving the lives of others? I would like to express my feeling of deep gratitude for your team’s hard work and for all those who worked yesterday to search the forest in order to find my daughter. Thanks for your numerous calls to keep us informed and for your patience in responding to ours. Your perseverance was fruitful. Our daughter is safe and sound!”