Commander’s Corner

It won't be long and 2006 will be here. 2005 has been a good year for us in many ways. Fundraising has been outstanding, both for the Squad and for Project Lifesaver. Tom and Mary Sander have directed the fundraising efforts for the Squad with mail out donation requests. This has been very very successful. Don Peters and Sgt Hudgens have directed the fundraising efforts for Project Lifesaver. This too has been very successful. We are already preparing for next years fundraising projects. The major Drawing for 2006 is going to be a trailer from Big Tex and an Arctic Cat 400 4X4 ATV. This is a very attractive package.

A lot of work has been done on the Squad property in Strawberry this year. We have a new training facility, new storage facility, new and relocated perimeter fence and a new roof. This was accomplished by the efforts of many Squad members. Trying to name all that have contributed would probably get me in trouble. I would like to express my sincerest thanks to all who have helped.

Training this year has been excellent. Our Safety Officer Ira Gibel is always providing excellent training in CPR, First Aid and valuable information at the General Meetings every month. Don Johnson coordinates the efforts of all the training during the year. Don also heads up training in Quad safety, Navigation and Map/Compass. Sgt Hudgens has provided training in GPS and Map & Compass and the use of Topo Maps. Les Hulse has generated an extremely useful Database. Les has provided training related to the database and use of his mapping software. Les is constantly updating this database to provide an accurate tool for search and rescue personnel thorough out the county. Roger Miotto and Bill Pitterle provide training in Technical Rope Rescue. A four day Rope Certification class has just been completed. Roger and Bill have both been through Reed Thorns "Ropes that Rescue" training in Sedona. Roger and Bill keep us abreast of the latest training and technology related to Technical Rope Rescue. Jim Martin provides training on Man Tracking. Jim conducts a Tracking Certification periodically though the year. Jim also provides class room and field training exercises to keep our skills sharp.

We have been blessed with Jack Quinn who helps with Public Relations and has created an outstanding Website.

Mike Taylor continues to generate an outstanding newsletter every month. This is a difficult task, especially when it's so hard to get new material and articles to put in the newsletter. Please contribute. I'm sure we all have a story to tell about some event in the woods or elsewhere. Take the time to share. We'd all love to hear it.

During the year we are asked to help out at various functions in the area. Sometimes we are compensated with monetary donations and sometimes we aren't. My point is that our members are always willing to help with these events. We contribute to the community in many ways other than Search and Rescue missions.

I'd like to thank all of you for making the Squad what it is today and thank you for always being there.

Stay active and stay healthy

Dave Pirtle
Commander

Don't forget; the meetings this month are November 8th for

the Board and November 10th for the General Meeting.
 

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Guest Article
Hardscrabble Canyon Search in the Mazatzal Wilderness


On the night of June 6, 2005, Hal and I received a phone call from Bill Pitterle, asking if we were willing to do a hiking team search the next morning. Apparently someone was lost and Bill wanted two hiking teams to go in for a search. Would Hal and I be one of those teams? It is hard to turn down Bill when he asks for help. Unfortunately we got little sleep as both of us kept thinking of the things we should not forget to take.

We met the next morning at the Squad building and headed out to the command post at Twin Buttes on Hardscrabble Mesa. We received a briefing from Sgt. Terry Hudgens Two friends, middle-aged men, had gone on an exploratory hike the previous day. They had hiked down some very difficult terrain and got to the bottom of Hardscrabble canyon. One of them felt it was getting too dangerous and did not want to keep going and decided to hike out, encouraging the other one to come out with him. However, the other friend decided to hike downstream thinking he could loop around to another trail that would take him back to where they started. When the friend did not come back out that night, the Sheriff was called. Helicopter searches with Night Vision Goggles that night had not turned up any clues. While we were being briefed the following morning, the helicopter was out searching again. The helicopter search went on without success until about 11:00 am when it was decided to send in the hiking teams.

Margaret Bullard and Bill headed out by foot from the command post. Their descent into the canyon was estimated to be more technical and they had the proper equipment and training. After descending into the canyon Bill and Margaret were going to hike downstream. Hal and I were taken by DPS helicopter to the southern part of the search area and our plan was to hike upstream.

The helicopter found a landing zone a little further south and west than planned, near the confluence of Fossil Creek and East Verde River in the Wilderness area. After getting out of the helicopter we first marked our position on our GPS. We called our coordinates into Sgt. Hudgens by SAT phone since our radios where not working at the location.

We then had to make our way down to the bottom of the canyon. Once there we headed up stream. At this point we learned our first major lesson of the day--when dropped from a high mesa to the bottom of a deep canyon, the weather (heat) can be a whole lot different. We had been told to expect a lot of difficulty with cats claw (wait-a-minute bush) and Manzanita. Although we had hiked many canyons and streams the past year, we were amazed at the amount of flood debris blocking are way. Large trees, boulders and brush had been washed into the narrow areas of the creek bed. It was obvious we had a wet spring by the amount of water in the creek and the difficulty of crossing several rapids. The going was slow. We had to frequently cross the creek as the cliff walls were too shear to scale. We tried rock hopping, taking our boots off and wading and just walking in the water. Unfortunately the water was high enough to get in our boots from the top. When nothing else would work we had to search for ways to climb out of the creek bed to get around obstructions.

Our plan was to call in to Terry each hour with our status. Each time we gave him our GPS coordinates. Terry warned us that there were two forks we needed to navigate correctly to get into the same canyon that the subject walked down. The first one, Hells Hole Canyon, was to be avoided at all cost or we would need rescuing, and the second one, Hardscrabble Canyon, was our target area for searching. Just the names of these places were bearing heavily on our minds.

We successfully navigated the forks in the creek and after requiring two hours to make just over a mile, we were finally hiking up Hardscrabble Creek. The water level was lower and we were able to make a little better progress. We were calling out the subjects name and looking for any signs. We were very mindful of the potential effects of the heat and ruggedness on the missing subject and therefore spent time looking into shaded areas, overhangs, water sources and other likely areas that an injured or exhausted hiker might have gone to. The challenge was doing a good job searching for signs balanced against making upstream progress. We stopped along the way to purify some water to replenish our supplies as the creek kept going under ground and we did not know how many additional opportunities we would have. (We had gone in with seven liters of water between us; it was not enough). Second important lesson of the day, planning for water backup as we did by taking a lightweight purifier is a must!

About 4:00 pm we finally obtained radio contact with the commander. We were already having concerns about returning to the LZ before dark and were wondering if we would be able to get taken out. Regular radio contact let us feel a little less alone and went a long way toward renewing our spirits. The commander suggested we might start hiking back to our drop-off spot so we could be picked up before dark. Well at this point we had been hiking about 4 1/2 hours. We were TIRED. There was no way we had enough energy left to hike all of the way back to our original landing zone. The heat and the stress of hiking with the weight of our packs had taken its toll. We looked at our map and found what we thought might be a good alternate landing zone. The topo indicated it was fairly level. Unfortunately it was about 1000 feet up a fairly steep hill. We decided to go take a look. We hiked up and though it was fairly flat terrain on top, it was scattered with low trees without any openings to enable a LZ. The challenge now was hiking back down. Having the pack weight on your back makes going down hill a little more challenging.

Before hiking up to look for a LZ, we had discussed either leaving the packs at the bottom or only one of us going up. Both of these options conflicted with our SAR training and so we decided to stay together and take our gear with us. Although a wise and proper decision, it increased our exhaustion. Third hard lesson, know when you've had enough and stop. Not sure we did this one as well as we should.

Back down in the creek bed, the decision was made to spend the night in the canyon. I was so tired I think I could have slept anywhere. Hal thought it best we had a tent. Terry volunteered to have his tent, some MREs and water dropped off by helicopter to our location. We found a nice sandy spot to pitch the tent that was about a foot short of the tent floor size but close enough. We set up before it turned dark. We found a safe place to store our food away from the tent and settled down for the night. It was very eerie and the discovery that Arizona does have fire flies added to the strangeness.

After lying awake most of the night but getting some rest anyway, we got up about 4:30am. Being our first overnight mission we wondered whether anyone would be manning the radio at that time. We made our call and Vynette and Cliff answered immediately. It was nice to hear their voices, especially since we were still feeling totally isolated. That is when we found out the subject had been found by another team that had rappelled in the previous evening to a position between our team and Margaret/Bill team.

We therefore did not need to proceed up stream to continue the search. We expected to hike back to our original drop off spot, but with very sore legs. Then Cliff mentioned that the helicopter spotted a landing zone not very far down stream from our campsite. So we headed off looking for it. We found an area that looked to be large enough. Unfortunately the ground consisted of the dry creek bed with many large boulders. The helicopter crew notified us that we were not in the right place and needed to hike a quarter mile further. They also advised us that they would not be able to land at the designated pickup spot and asked if we were OK with climbing into the helicopter while they hovered above the rocky dry creek bed. We would need to get into the helicopter slowly. We received instructions on how to proceed, which we followed carefully. Anything to save us from hiking out!


Kathy Baas
558

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Needed:
A trailer to transport an 8 Foot X 8 Foot shed to Ellenwood Ranch for Storage of supplies for the rescued Katrina Dogs.

Contact: Tom Sander 476-4076

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November 2005 Training Schedule