Mounted search and rescue

["Irvin Lichtenstein " <ilichten1@verizon.net>]

One does not have to forget an obsolete technique, just not use it anymore.  In 1979 the only technique used was lines and grids.  Then we got air scent dogs which proved useless in our area until they learned how to discriminate.  We started using mystical trackers and then pragmatic trackers (different schools of mental state while tracking) to support our foot hasty teams.  In 1986 we started with horses.  What I said was I could teach a spontaneous volunteer or a volunteer firefighter, to line search in ten minutes, not the 8-16 hours required by some courses.  If I have 16 hours of training time I would much rather spend it on tracking than line searching training.

We don’t do evidence searches [don’t tell the DA that, he gave us $5000 for a radio so we could] because there are plenty of cadets in the regional police academy who need field experience shuffling through the grass if the detectives don’t find it with their metal detectors, radar, and other toys.  We try to avoid looking for known dead people because of the time it takes from volunteers afterward at inquests and trials.

 

I have been involved with developing standards, both military and civilian for years.  I helped invent the software development life cycle standards and the project management techniques used on AEGIS, FAA ATC, Seawolf, and other projects.  I was a founding member of ASTM F32, a FEMA volunteer executive reservist for over 30 years, a member of NASAR for around 30 years by now, used to be a member of the IAFC, am a member of the NFPA.  I was even president of the PA SAR Council once upon a time, and the first fire instructor accredited to teach search management.  I may possibly be the only Senior Member of the IEEE who does not have an engineering or physical sciences degree.  And, unlike most of the NASAR officials, I have never been paid as a search person.  I do get paid to teach at the fire academy on the rare occasions a search course is offered.   

 

I know search, and a few other things too. Any attempt to top down standards from an organization that has little or no respect as a user oriented organization will

result in destroying what little volunteer search is left in the country.  When USAR teams were first proposed they were to be volunteers from the region.  When FEMA finally accepted the idea it became a response for career personnel.  Philadelphia Fire withdrew its application for funding until the rules were changed to allow it to use the

equipment for non-FEMA responses.  There is no national standard for firefighting.  There are two accepted tests against the NFPA standards for career firefighters, but they are not required by any national authority because national authorities don’t fight structural fires or vehicle fires. They fight forest fires on national lands, and often do it with contractors who are neither federal firefighters or local government personnel and until recently were not considered public safety personnel. The Fed DOJ

is hinting that what PA calls Special Fire Police, persons trained to protect the fire scene from intrusion and take the hit if needed are not “fire suppression personnel” and therefore when they get run over on the highway covering our rescue personnel they are not entitled to LODD benefits.  The new PA EMS Act’s SAR provisions were

written by one person who is a dilettante  in the search field, but who happens to be an MD and thinks all searchers should be ALS qualified before they step off the truck.

If that makes you a better searcher fine, all I think it makes you is an unpracticed medic since few SAR teams run 400 ALS calls a year. 

 

Looking at the carrot—grant money, the feds don’t give SAR NGO’s any money now so what do we lose? The major direct grant programs, AFA and SAFER exclude any organization that is not a municipal fire department or municipal EMS organization.  At least in the East SAR is a regional function and in most of the west it is a county or state function.  Unless the federal law is changed there is no money whether you have credentials or not.  In PA similar programs are similarly limited and specifically define fire suppression eligibles and require EMS to be licensed emergency responders.  Under the old PA EMS Act (Act 45) SAR was specifically refused licensure because we didn’t transport by ambulance or aeromedical unit.   

 

I don’t know who the consultants are that being hired to advise governments about these needs to credential wilderness SAR people but they have little or no credence in the on the ground community and if they continue to work in the shadows they will destroy what little expertise exists in the community.  I think we should sue for fraud the next SAR expert who gets hired by a government agency without publicly being vetted as to his/her credentials.  On the other hand anyone who wants my CV can have it, all 14 pages of it.  And all my publications are available from the publishers (at least the ones who haven’t gone bankrupt).

 

My rates are cheap and I can be insured by Lloyds if needed to protect your agency’s money. 

 

Irv Lichtenstein

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From: msar-riders-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org [mailto:msar-riders-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of pennbo@verizon.net
Sent: Wednesday, March 10, 2010 11:43 PM
To: msar-riders@lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: Re: [MSAR] Standards for mounted SAR