Mounted search and rescue

[Una Smith <una@lanl.gov>]

I did a night search on foot once, in heavy forest, for a field
worker who did not return to camp at the end of the day.  It was
a hasty search on trails.  We used flashlights and whistles, and
our goal was simply to find the missing woman ASAP.  We stopped
searching near midnight, when it began to rain so heavily that we
could no longer hear each other's whistles.  This was in a Costa
Rican rainforest, and it had been raining pretty much constantly
for the previous month.  Soon after dawn the following morning,
just as we resumed the search, the missing woman walked out of the
forest.  She had been working off-trail, got disoriented and lost,
and after wandering in circles in the dark for hours, she found
a relatively dry spot under a tree, and sat there for the entire
night.

A search like this could easily be conducted on horseback.  In a
hasty search in general, MSAR has a significant advantage:  faster
travel than on foot, yet with much less background noise than a
motor vehicle. 

Another night search I was on involved running a trail looking 
for a group of backpackers who missed a scheduled meet-up with
our group.  This suggested they were in need of help.  We found
them, 4 hours back on their planned route at a trailhead.  They
were okay, but had decided to abandon most of their route and
just wait for us at the trailhead (they were dropped off there),
hoping that when they didn't show up we would be smart enough to
look at our map and decide to look for them there.  One of their
group sprained an ankle badly several days earlier, requiring an
evacuation on a litter (SAR asssisted), and they were exhausted.

Both of these searches involved very low probability of a need
to find tracks, signs, evidence, or any other clues.  So it was
not important that we be able to see well;  we needed to see
only well enough to travel safely.  Horses are very appropriate
for these types of night searches.  In the case of an evidence
search at night, I would be concerned about clue destruction if
trying to use horses;  the rider cannot easily see what is
beneath the horse, nor totally control the horse's every step. 
Probably I would leave my horse in camp and search on foot.

        Una Smith
        Santa Fe County Sheriff's Posse, in New Mexico