Olds Search and Rescue (OSAR) members are trained even better than before after they – and people from across the province -- attended a Search and Rescue Basics Train the Trainer course in Olds.
OSAR is a volunteer group of members that train to a skill standard where they can be tasked as a resource by the RCMP, fire department, EMS, Town of Olds, Mountain View County and the province of Alberta.
The skill standards are set by the Alberta Search and Rescue Association, which falls under the Search and Rescue Secretariat of Canada. To be a search and rescue member, each volunteer must have the basic standards of First Aid/AED - Level C, Incident Command System (ICS) 100 and the Search and Rescue Fundamentals.
Search and Rescue Basics is a 60-hour course that introduces new volunteer members to the fundamentals of search and rescue.
To ensure that our members are properly trained, a SAR Basics Train the Trainer course is presented to qualified members in various parts of Alberta.
The Olds course was held September 26-28, where 13 qualified members from Cold Lake, Fort McMurray, Parkland, Sundre and Olds were trained and some re-certified by the Emergency Response Institute of Canada to be Certified SAR Basic instructors.
During the three-day course, students went to different facilities in our area (Cipperly's Pond and a small park in Olds) to do the hands-on practical training.
The training consists of, but is not limited to, legal aspects of search and rescue, critical incident stress, communications and helicopter operations.
It also includes searching in different types of weather. An example would be cold weather, including hypothermia, frostbite and night searching.
Wearing the appropriate clothing and having outdoor skills and knowing the environmental hazards for our search and rescue volunteer members is very important.
SAR Basic Instructors also train in lost person behaviour, fire-starting, search management operations, and urban and wilderness search and rescue.
That includes the use of different types of tactics and the proper techniques of reading and working with only a map and compass which is all part of navigation, as SAR members cannot rely 100 per cent on GPS units.
The six SAR Basic instructors from Olds will be utilizing their certifications on Oct. 17, 18, 19, 25 and 26 when they train 17 new search and rescue members for Cochrane, Sundre and Olds in the 60-hour SAR basic course which will be held at the OSAR office 4502 – 46 Ave. in Olds, and the hands-on practical at Eagle Hill Community Centre on Oct. 25, when members will be taught fire-starting, shelter building, tracking, map/GPS/compass, and take part in a Training Exercise Mock Search.
Dawson is a search manager, SAR Basic instructor, and director of resources and training for the Olds Search and Rescue Society.
