Student survives quirky ambulance trip to Mongolia

A SOUTHSIDE medical student has spoken about the hair-raising and quirky charity ambulance rally he embarked upon across 18 countries to Mongolia.

On July 7, Robin McManus (26), from Ballsbridge joined Tristram Hills (22) from Wales and Grant Dawson (22) from Canada as they departed from Dublin in the converted vehicle.

Just over four weeks later, on August 3, the team who are all studying in the Royal College of Surgeons, delivered the second hand ambulance, which they purchased out of their own pockets at a cost of about e4,000, to the British Go Help charity in the Mongolian capital, Ulaanbaatar.

The trio had completed the Mongolia Charity Rally, which is an epic 10,000 mile pan-continental charity road trip that crosses numerous mountain ranges, deserts and barren and inhospitable lands.

The medical students then donated the vehicle to Go Help, which operates an ambulance service in Mongolia, as well as providing aid in the development of schools and libraries.

The rally is like no other in that all the participating teams take part in ambulances or similar emergency vehicles.

Robin said the epic journey took the trio through 17 countries along 9,000 miles of road and 2,000 miles of dirt track, mainly in Mongolia as it has few modern roads.

The young medical student explained how the team were lucky to have completed the trip after they needed to be rescued on several occasions.

“Two days before the finish we hit a stretch of dirt track that had dried out but a mass of trucks had gone through it and left these huge deep rivets,

? he recalled.

“There was no way around it and we ripped a hole in the bottom of the fuel tank, so we were gushing fuel.

“We were actually really lucky that there were some truckers at the other side who had stopped for a break.

“They patched the inside of tank with the fibreglass and covered the outside of the hole with this black resin. It got the vehicle to the charity in Ulaanbataar where a mechanic fixed it.

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Robin explained that when they arrived in Ulaanbaatar on August 3, they met the team that had finished in first place.

“The guys who arrived in Ulaanbataar 24 hours ahead of us had actually pulled us out of a river on our first day in Mongolia.

?

In addition, Robin said the team had to bribe corrupt border guards in Ukraine to gain access to the country.

“Parts of the Ukraine were quite dodgy,

? he revealed.

“It was the one and only place where we had to bribe border officials. These two massive border guards came out and took the car apart. We ended up having to pay them e20 to get into the country.

?

He also told how the team was shocked at the sight of abandoned cars with bullet holes in them that were strewn across a border post in neighbouring Moldova.

“It was like stepping into a war zone,

? he added.

“Clearly cars had been shot at trying to get into the country.

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Anyone who wants to learn more about the Mongolian Charity Rally can log on to gohelp.org.uk/