Fellow’s Profile
Mike Spencer
Fellow’s Profile
Mike Spencer
Drowned (or deposited) Victim Detection Otter Project
Fellowship
Themes
Focus
Pioneering the use of Eurasian otters to locate missing people from sub-surface water environments
Countries
Fellowship year
2025
Locality
South East
Contact
Biography
In 2023 (latest available data) there were 659 water-related fatalities in the UK. I want to improve the UK's capability to locate missing persons underwater, to repatriate them with their loved ones more quickly. To do this I want to pioneer the use of Eurasian otters.
I am a serving police sergeant and police search adviser and I have been involved in police search operations regionally, nationally and internationally for over 25 years. For 19 years I was a police dog handler. I firmly believe that the care in which our dead are treated is a mark of how civilised a society we are. My project encompasses this ethos. I am exceptionally passionate about missing person search and rescue, working with animals and helping people. This passion combined with my past and current experience fuels my desire to explore the possibilities to return people's loved ones to them sooner, by bridging a gap in our current sub-surface victim detection capabilities.
Disclaimer
All Reports are copyright © the author. The moral right of the author has been asserted. The views and opinions expressed by any Fellow are those of the Fellow and not of the Churchill Fellowship or its partners, which have no responsibility or liability for any part of them.
Disclaimer
All Reports are copyright © the author. The moral right of the author has been asserted. The views and opinions expressed by any Fellow are those of the Fellow and not of the Churchill Fellowship or its partners, which have no responsibility or liability for any part of them.
