Swiftwater Rescue Training Vital In BC
Sunday, August 18, 2013 @ 4:23 AM
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Instructor Rob Vance explains the importance of hitting the mark with a throw bag. Photos 250 News
Prince George, B.C. – Prince George Search and Rescue members and a few other participants are receiving some valuable training in swift water rescue techniques this weekend.
Raven Rescue out of Smithers is running the Swiftwater Rescue Training course. Friday was spent in the classroom while Saturday and Sunday were set aside for practical instruction both in and outside the water. Participants are receiving that hands-on direction at the Willow River rest stop on Highway 16, the same location where a 60-year-old woman slipped and fell into the river and vanished on May 7th of this year.
Rob Vance, who lives in Canmore, Alberta, is the instructor for this course. He says his selection of this particular spot had nothing to do with that incident. “I know it’s a spot that they’ve has some incidents but it’s also a good spot to train. What I’m looking for, I wasn’t aware of that incident at the time, but there’s better flow here. It’s smaller than the big rivers in town and we’re looking for a little bit more flow, smaller areas so that it’s safer for everybody.”
Regarding the course Vance says “the first thing we teach them is self-rescue, making sure they can rescue themselves out of a river. That is most important, especially if they’re going down to do a search. From there it’s working on techniques to using some aids to rescue other people, aids such as throw bags, then moving towards swimming techniques and swimming after people is what we’re going to progress to.”
The throw bags are meant for water and have floating rope in them. Vance explains that “they’re rope piled in a floating bag that we throw out to people that gains us distance from shore so that maybe we don’t have to get in the water, which is safer for the rescuers.”
He says the course is taken by people outside the Search and Rescue field. “We do this training for a lot of different folks, emergency services, fire departments. We also do a lot of training for environmental consulting firms and groups that are doing things like fish sampling and river sampling out in the field. By taking this course they’re working more safely and not putting themselves in dangerous positions at work. We also train people like river rafting guides, kayakers and canoers.
Vance says this course has been around since the 1970’s. “Raven Rescue is part of Rescue 3 International, it started in the United States and is now an international company so we teach all over the world.”
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