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msar-riders - Re: [MSAR] Air Support

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Subject: Mounted search and rescue

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Chronological Thread  
  • From: Una Smith <una.smith@att.net>
  • To: Mounted search and rescue <msar-riders@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [MSAR] Air Support
  • Date: Fri, 14 Jul 2006 14:45:48 -0600

Paul Fleming has really good advice about horses and helicopters.
And a handout too: http://www.ibiblio.org/msar/dox/heli.pdf. He
sent me his handout as an MSWord file 2.5 years ago. I converted
the file to PDF but didn't get around to putting it on the MSAR
website. I have fixed that now.


Paul Fleming wrote:
>When your ground teams train with helicopters take your horses too. Just
>hang around a couple hundred feet away and let the horses watch.

To start. You may need to get closer, eventually. That depends
on how much space your local helicopter jockeys usually require;
if they will land almost on top of you, then you probably should
train for that.

Decide in advance which of the horses are likely to be cool, and
put them a little closer than the others. The others will feel
safer and grow calm faster, seeing a calm horse between them and
the scary stuff.


> If your
>horse is real skittish let him watch from the safety of his trailer at
>first.

Park the trailer still farther away. That is important, because
part of the social contract re trailers is that they are a safe
place. So don't do something that the horse may consider breaks
the social contract. See below.


>That being said we also require horses to be held not tied when a
>helicopters are in the vicinity.

Another social contract thing. Horses should be tied only in a
safe place. Hence, being tied should be very reassuring to the
horse, but that requires some care and attention by the handler.
Never deliberately frighten a horse that is tied; that simply
violates the "tied = safe" social contract and teaches the horse
that being tied is *not* safe. Which sets you up for a panicky
horse setting back at the trailer and maybe breaking away. All
Very Bad Stuff to happen in front of SAR management in camp at a
SAR mission, lemme tell ya.


> You and the horse
>can be startled. Its part of the job. Not much we can do about that. Guess
>that's why we wear helmets

Absolutely. And I think it is helpful to distinguish between
being startled and spooking. In a nutshell, spooking is simply
over-reacting to some stimulus. A panic attack. An initial
startle may occur, or not. You need to ride well enough to sit
through a startle; your horse needs to (learn to) not panic.

Una Smith
New Mexico




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