Mounted search and rescue

["IRVIN LICHTENSTEIN" <ilichten1@verizon.net>]

Water and feed ride in the trailer-- up to 45 gallons of home barn water in
15 gal drums, 5 gallons of feed in a pail, up to 3 bales of hay from home.
Four flat back buckets, a fork, a broom, and a set of shoes (RB #4) and #8
nails often are in the trailer as well. 

I haven't weighed the bags but I can easily handle them one handed. 
Also I left out some ladder splints and a new toy, a Kendrick Traction
Device.  Long leg splint but built in short segments, like a fold up cane,
connected by shock cord. Weighs less than a pound and less than 8 inches
long, but can immobilize a femur fracture. Most of the stuff in the bags
weighs next to nothing individually, other than the pliers and water, the
carrots. The 150 MHz radio weighs 48 ounces according to the spec, I haven't
weighed the 800 MHz unit.  As to carrying stuff on me rather than in the
bags, two thoughts: I weigh enough already, and I don't want to land on a
cell phone or a set of EMT tools, the radios hurt enough.   

My bags were ordered long in the cantle (26") and thin in the sides because
the standard ones would get caught on trees and tear.  They have a breakaway
feature where the sections connect.  Also, my saddle has oversize skirts and
fenders so the bags rest mostly on leather, not skin. 

You also have to realize that I am fairly large (6'-2" and 275 pounds) and
my mount is correspondingly sized at 17-2, 1700 pounds, and is a Percheron,
not a short twitch muscle breed by any means. He knows when he is working a
search and lets me know how he feels. He can be dripping wet and still have
pulse and respiration within norms at 20 years old without conditioning.  

In most of Pennsylvania you need to haul water.  Some of the state parks
have water treatment plants for campgrounds but it was less than 5 years ago
that the county drilled wells at the trailheads in their parks.  While the
state park has drinking fountains with electric pumps the county has a hand
pump on a well that deep enough to keep the kids working hard on the handle.
There is no surface water safe to drink at all. If it isn't goose droppings,
or mine drainage, or asbestos, it is TCE or MBTE contamination. Even
municipal systems have problems.   

Irv Lichtenstein