Rescue crews hone their skills

PROVO — The cliffs around Bridal Veil Falls in Provo Canyon were teeming with neon-clad search and rescue personnel Saturday morning.

But, even though the crew safely brought three people down from the mountain on stretchers, no one was ever stranded, hurt or dehydrated. The victims were only pretending, and the Utah County Sheriff's Office Search and Rescue team was only practicing.

"We want to get our team up to speed," said sheriff's Sgt. Tom Hodgson. "We've been seeing an increase in calls in Utah County, so we need to get our team in the environment they are going to be working in and train as realistically as possible."

The all-volunteer search crew — 45 men and women from a mishmash of back grounds — gets together about twice a month to train.

During Saturday's exercises, crews helped a fallen rock climber, a man who was stuck on a ledge and a rappeller who got stuck dangling on his rope. The only difference between the simulation and a real-life rescue operation was that the "victims" volunteered to get stranded, Hodgson said. Crews were outfitted with full gear, and a Life Flight helicopter stood by.

"These are technical rescues — they're not just going up the trail to bring someone down," he said. "We need to practice and hone our skills in this type of environment because when it comes down to the nuts and bolts of it, when we have to bring somebody off this ledge, we need to be sure we can do it."

Hodgson, who oversaw the operation, decided to add a little twist to the scenario this time by simulating not just one accident, but three. Rescue personnel were stretched thin as they hustled to get all three "victims" off the mountain, which, Hodgson said, is not uncommon in real life.

"Sometimes we'll go months without getting any calls and then get three in one night," said Olin Johnson, 40, a search and rescue team member from Highland.

Johnson had to sit out Saturday's training because of a sprained ankle, but he staked out a spot at the incident command post to watch the operation. He said he typically spends about 14 hours a month training in various environments including caves, rivers and lakes. If the team is called out to tote someone out of the mountains, or help a hiker down a trail, the time commitment sometimes jumps to 50 hours.

But for Johnson, who has been involved in the program for eight years, training isn't a burden. He sees training as an "excuse" to work on the mountaineering and backcountry work he had made a hobby of all his life, he said.