ALPINE FINAL : The rescue is only part of the story. What happens before the call? How are teams built? How do they train, prepare, and perform when everything is on the line? At the Rescue Lab, we go behind the scenes with specialized rescue teams and the people who make them possible. Exploring the training, leadership, and culture behind operational readiness. From the New England Rescue Collaborative, this is the Rescue Lab. Hey, welcome back to the Rescue Lab. We got Steve Wilson from the Alpine Rescue Team today, and we're talking to him about. The team's history and what does 700 rescues teach you about building a rescue team that lasts. Steve, welcome to the The Rescue Lab Podcast. Thanks so much, PJ. It's great to be here. No, absolutely. Before we get into it, why don't you just give us a little bit of background about yourself? Okay. Well, I joined Alpine Rescue Team in 1996 when I started grad school in Golden, Colorado, and learned how to rock climb and mountaineer undergrad. And this seemed like a really good way to Give something back and get out of the classroom once in a while. Yeah. Turns out that that was certainly true. Yes. And well, the Steve of nineteen ninety six, if you look to, know, where the team is now, you know, you guys say it's over seven hundred plus search and rescue missions. What do you think the the Steve of then t totally misunderstood about what where you guys are at now? I think he would have under misunderstood exactly what that means. It it's it's so much more than than a way to get out of the classroom. It's it's not a way to to to get into the mountains and get out of something else. It is a whole other life unto itself that has led me in places I'd never imagined I would go. Yeah. Yeah, I'm sure. Is there is there some mission from those those seven hundred calls out that I know I keep saying that, but it seems like a very fundamental thing for the team, is it not? Yeah. There's and and seven hundred sounds like a lot and and I'm proud of that number, but there are people on a team that have twice as many or or more. there seven hundred to some people doesn't is is a drop in a bucket of how many search and rescue calls they've been on. So making a big deal out of it. No, absol I think it's what we try to talk about here is the fact that the you know, the rescue spectrum There are people that go their whole career waiting for that one call and then there's people on the other end of the spectrum that, they every day is a a different call out and every day is a different mission. So we tr how do you traverse that spectrum and stay motivated and, while waiting for that call to come in? It's just about building building that team and keeping the team ready to go if you don't have that luck. but was there was there a mission in particular that, fundamentally changed the way you approach rescue? There I think there's a couple missions that I can remember that that set the hook, so to speak. And once that hook was set, there was there was no going back to my old life. Probably my second year on the team, in nineteen ninety-seven, we searched for a I think a three year old boy that had wandered away from his campsite. And it was a middle of the day when most people back then had regular jobs, and it was a real difficult thing to get enough people on a like a Tuesday late morning to be able to come to a mission. And I was lucky I was in a spot where I could in grad school. I told my advisor, hey, I I just got this call for a for a missing kid. And that reply was, Why are you still here? Yeah. That's great though. So it starts start going. And me and one other guy in a field team ended up hurting the little kid because he was not wanting to be found. He was he was freaked out in the woods. Right. He wanted to be found, but, from his perspective, he had been lost in the woods and now big bad guys are chasing after him. And we herded him into the arms of a Forest Service Ranger, a guy in uniform in a in a white truck that the kid recognized as a good guy. Yeah. And it's funny to put it in that perspective. Yeah. When when we when we came out of the woods, you could just see the look on his face of, all right, they're the bad guys. You get get a why why why why aren't you getting them? Yeah, right. And by the time we all got back to the to the campsite with his parents, I was holding him in my arms and giving a candy bar and and, you know, handing that kid back to his parents is a is a feeling that that I'll never forget. And it hooks you for life. And every mission since then, the bad ones, I think back the feeling that I had with his kid. And it gets me through it. And the good ones are just reinforcing that. And we have so many more good ones than bad ones. That's that's an important that's an important thing. The Up the Up Eye team has been around since what, nineteen fifty-nine. What did you inherit from the generations before you that you believe is your responsibility to preserve? It's the the same thing that I've I've lived that there's some special pixie dust that that that makes that team a team. Yeah. We we're a family almost and we we share the good times, we share the bad times, and those are I look at it as those are the best people walking the planet. And I'm lucky to be able to associate with them at all. And that's my job to to propagate that to the future. Yeah, and and just be the steward of the team and at that point, right? Right. Yeah, yeah. That's the exact right term. Yeah. And I d it it's the team's all a volunteer. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Okay. And how many members on team? Probably seventy five to eighty total. There's a there's a variety of of different places where people end up on the team or we call associate members that help with the fundraising and the administrative things that don't go in the field. And I think right now we have close to seventy field active members that go on the field regularly on missions and have attendance requirements and training requirements and and things like that. And you guys you handle everything from lost hikers, avalanches, high altitude incidents, technical vertical rescue, which is pretty cool. Yeah. But how do you maintain, genuine capability across that many emission profiles? Well, the the easy thing is that we actually have missions in all of those disciplines. So, when we know we're gonna have to use those skills, we train on them constantly. We train every other weekend. Every Wednesday night we have a training or a meeting of of some sort to to work on the skills, to debrief what happened in the in the last mission, what it what went right, what do we need to improve on. And and we get enough missions that it keeps everybody engaged. Yeah, I think that that can be the death of of a team if they're not busy enough and all they ever do is train. You you wear off the edge. Yeah, that's that's the exact that's the conversation. Yeah, when we when we get to to train a lot and then and then we face a July with thirty one days and thirty five missions, it keeps that edge pretty home. Yeah. And then we we we look for the breaks in the action to to catch our breath and introduce ourselves to our families and and things like that. Also important. Right. Right. And and and we realize that not everybody can make it or nobody can make it to every mission. And and nobody has to make it to every mission. And what we need is the the team that that none of the missions happen because of a single person. All of the missions happen because of the the entire team, all working for a common goal, each with a specific role that's that's critical to the overall goal. Yeah, you brought up a great point about that when a team is able to to work that many incidents, and they they hone that skill and the team gets better, you know, as those events go on, right? And on the volunteer side, I don't know if you've been following I've been sort of keeping track of just some of the headlines that go around and some of the some of the stories that have come out of New York State with SAR teams and how there's sort of that decline in call outs and it sort of, you know, reeks them the problems with morale and then there's a drop off and I thought that was a very interesting take 'cause you guys are the polling opposite of that. It's yeah, it's a death spiral it happens. And and we we just don't have that issue. We're close enough to the Denver area that that we have beautiful mountains and lots of locations for people from Denver and and visiting from elsewhere go up and you know, we we never run out of of bad things happening in the mountains. And so we we just don't face that. We also have Denver as a as a pool from which to get new candidates for membership and fundraising activities and things like that. So we're we're kind of in a lucky place where I think everything kind of comes together. And it's been that way since the beginning. And we don't rest on our laurels. We we make sure we keep the team healthy and strong and and hopefully try to keep abreast of of current trends in the industries and and the the best equipment that we can use and things like that. And and just not getting complacent in what we do, I think keeps everybody a little healthier too. Yeah. And I think that's where it gets hard when you are training constantly, you are always fighting that complacency. And I think that's that's something I I talk about. And I look at my own rescue team back at the fire department is just it's it's always that fight for being ready but fighting complacency at the same time. It's a it can be a tough balance. Right. And that's this one benefit we have for having so many members is that we we don't we try not to burn everybody out. And we we don't push everybody to be on every mission. It's one of those things that the more you contribute, more you participate, the the more you get back. And when you're at all the trainings and you're up on your skills, you get put in the more fun roles in more important roles and missions. And The hard part is if you fall out of that loop, you go and kinda go on your own death spiral of I'm not linking it to trainings, so missions are dull. So I don't go to missions, so I don't go to trainings and I don't get in the roles and it it it that's how we lose people. Yeah, and that's I think that's on leadership too, to see that in other in team members. if the leadership is not dealing with the same issue them themselves, I mean that's right. That's unfortunate the hard part. Yeah, that that happens as well. Yeah. And so you talk about the people that come out of the training. What's the difference between someone who has been trained in Mountain Rescue and someone you actually trust beside you on a difficult mission? Well, it's it all comes down to how much time you spent with them in the field. And that's it's one reason why it takes a while to become a full member of the team when you first join. You go through your individual training as a as a class of new members. You get integrated into the team when that training is completed. And then you just go on missions. And you hope you get enough missions with enough people that you get familiar. That's the the foxhole mentality of you know, when you share share the foxhole with somebody in a firefight, you suddenly become very close to them. And then there's no substitute for that. And you know, when you go then you go to the missions and One of things that happened in the last few years is we don't have the big long searches that we used to have. You don't spend four hours hiking through the woods looking for somebody and talking about what other things you talk about. Your mind occupied. Exactly. Yeah. No, I I I've been there. You know, but the difference is you just need time with with each other. Right. And it's time in training, it's time on missions, it's also time having a beer afterwards. Yeah, it's the classic trauma bonding. You need to trauma bond. Some of it is. Yeah, absolutely. we always talk about building up these teams and the ideal, having the right the right people join the team, but what happens what does Alpine do when somebody's just not a right fit for the team? How were you guys able to handle that? Well that that's self correcting as well. When somebody's not the right fit, they know it just as much as everybody else does. And you can tell pretty pretty cl pretty early on that They're here to get the patch. They're here to get the jacket. They're here for the for the glory of it. And when they figure out that there's really not a lot of glory in this, there's no paycheck. It costs a lot of money. And it costs a lot of time. It's a huge commitment. Suddenly they're it just doesn't pay off for them. And they we very seldom have to deal with it. They deal with it themselves. You know what, this isn't for me. I think that's a common thread in maybe the SAR community. And I it was funny, I was watching something the other day. I I I do jujitsu on the side and I've been doing it for quite a quite a few years and it's there was this video that caught me and it just said, you can always tell the people that aren't gonna last. And it's the people that show up and they buy every piece of gear and they're telling everybody online, Hey, I do jujitsu now and then they show up four times a week, then it's maybe three times, then it's two, and then you never see again. That's where it's just it's the slow and steady that in anything in life and it you have to have a passion for it, right? It's not just it's not a a fad or it's something that you have to actually live it in a sense. Right. And I th I think the one of the keys is making sure that when new members are are interested in the team that they have realistic expectations as to what it is to be on the team, what the commitment is, what the the sacrifices they have to make are gonna be, and what the real benefits are. it it sounds exciting to be flying around in helicopters and and rescuing people from cliffside abysses. And none of that is the reality at all. It's dull drudgery a lot of the time. Yeah. And it it has usually has a big payoff at the end, but you know, it's it's not the glory, it's not the adrenaline. It's the slow steady, just get your job done kind of thing. Yeah, and I think you s you hit right in the before it's eventually it becomes the people that you're working with that that pushes that when that pager goes off that you want to go and be part of that. Yeah. What what characteristics have you found in people who become exceptional rescuers? You have to be a good team worker. You have to understand, you have to have the humility to know that you number one, you don't know everything. Number two, you can't do everything, and that you're a critical cog in this machine, and that machine does amazing things. Me, that's what it what it all comes down to is that every cog is important and it's important that that cog function properly. You have to have the skills. You have to be comfortable in the outdoors. You just have to be comfortable being uncomfortable. Exactly. Yeah. You have to be able to deal with being cold and wet and tired and hungry and still be able to function. And realize that at the end of it, You can warm up, you can get food, you can get water, and you may not have too long before the next one happens. Right. It it could be right after. It could be right right, yeah. Sometimes it happens at the same time. Yeah, exactly. And you get pulled from one right into the other. Yeah. But that's where that is a payoff in itself, right? It is. Yeah. Yeah. And then it's sometimes that's the only payoff r in reality. And and you have to be someone who can accept that as the payoff. Right. And it's that's but that's an intrinsic you have to find the person with that intrinsic value. Right. how much do think becoming a rescue professional is learning when not to do something? I think there's it's it's part of at least becoming a leader in in rescue to know when maybe not when not to do something, but when to do it a different way. You know, it's it's very seldom that we get to the point where The answer is don't do anything. It's more common that the answer is we have to find a better, safer, more efficient way of doing this. Because conditions are such or injuries are such or location or whatever. You know, we have to have that persistence, stubbornness to not give up and realize that we the one thing we can't do, the cardinal rule is not don't make it worse. Yeah, exactly. Don't don't hurt our own people above everything else. Yeah, and I I think that's a great point about the leadership side. You everyone's obviously looking out for safety and all that stuff, but w when you become a leader in the SAR side, you have to have that bigger picture of what's going on. You have now you you're in charge of the team, the team's safety, but you still have to accomplish the mission. And that's sometimes you have to take the the hard steps of maybe of maybe not doing or not going that way and doing something different. And I think that can be difficult in its own in its own right. It is. And it can be difficult on both sides because sometimes you're you're telling people to go risk your life to do this and trust the leadership that that's that's the right way to do it. And you also have to be able to say, Don't risk your life to do this. There's a better way, there's a different way, or it's just not worth it. We're gonna have to come back when it's when the conditions are are favorable or something. Yeah, and I I've I've definitely heard stories, people are out searching and they're Hey guys, we have to pull out and we'll come back. I can I can imagine that just being incredibly difficult. It is. It is. but when you we have the North Star of don't get our own people hurt, you know. Me and my teammates are number one. And the subject is important, but whoever it is is is less important than my teammates. Even if it's just to buy a little bit, you still The priority is still teammates. Yeah. Unless it's that one guy who's always still on the trail mix, then right. Then it's teammate with a with a small T, not a capital T. Yeah. Exactly. So it in building out, special ops teams, search teams, we always look at capability. We're trying to s we're trying to study capability and and competence in that in a team setting. you can assemble a room full of individually trained or and talented rescuers and still not have a capable rescue team. What do you think actually turns competent individuals into operational capability as a team? That's that's the hard part. You have to have leaders that are competent and know all the skills, know where to put the right people in the right spots. You also have to have teammates, team members that have that humility to know that one, they may be able to do all of these tasks, but we need them to do this single one because we have all the other people that are doing. their tasks. It's again the machine, you need all the cogs in there. And it takes five or six different things happening for the team to work. And if the team doesn't work, none of the individuals work. And the the hard part about the balance is always we want we want team members that will will follow the instructions of the of the leaders. You know, do it do what we ask of them of them. We also want them to be empowered to ask their own questions and to to jump up and and not just blindly follow, but sort of informedly follow. And that's that's sometimes a more difficult balance. Yeah, and I that was actually led into my next question. It was, you know, there's these standardized systems and you you have to follow these chains of command, but you also need to allow experienced rescuers kind of freedom to improvise. right. Yeah, especially on a mission, maybe if if you're losing control of something we have to change and it's on the fly, that's a delicate balance. It it is. It's always a delicate balance to say we have some members that are just really great rock climbers, mountaineers, rope access people, rope rescue people. And and sometimes we really need those specific skills, and sometimes we really don't. And we don't need to make a a leaping flying catch on every pot fly. Sometimes you need to. But if it's just a simple fly fly, you can just sit there and catch it. Let's do it that way. It's safer, it's quicker. Everybody's on the same page. Sometimes you gotta make the leaping cash that saves the home run. Yeah, and l and then also less chance of blowing out your ACL for no reason. Exactly. so so not everything needs to be this spectacular thing, but sometimes it does. And we need to have those we need to have both of those assets. Ready to go. Yeah, and it and it's a delicate balance of employing of employing them at the right moment. w what is the right moment. and I I guess it's kind of that mixture of trusting your team or that individual to make like, hey, you're gonna make that catch, I'm gonna that leaping catch, I'm gonna let you do it. What what is a relatively basic skill that experienced rescuers sometimes neglect because they're chasing more advanced techniques? Sometimes it's just as simple as tying the right knot. Tying the right knot. properly or being able to do it in front of people. In front of in front yeah, right. In front of people when it's really urgent, or really cold or wet or you have big gloves on, or just putting in the the the fundamental systems in places that are more complex than what you practiced. Yeah, we we practice tying knots around trees and rocks and and making an anchor and lowering something off of a off a device of some sort whole variety of devices. And well do that around a tree that's the the branches are always all the way to the ground and the maybe the tree is not quite as big as you'd like. And you know, how do you how do you apply the fundamentals to the real world without getting flustered, without forgetting those fundamentals? Yeah, you know it comes back to the fundamentals. Mm-hmm. I think it does. Always. Has Alpine ever changed a training practice or piece of equipment or operational procedure because a real real mission sort of exposed a weakness? That probably goes into more like AR is what it would be. It's it's more a matter of evolution. And that that evolution has changed over t the evolution has evolved over time. the LI started. The the equipment we used was adapted for mountaineering and rock climbing. And you know, there weren't specialized ropes and harnesses and and personal equipment and team equipment beyond World War II surplus litters, right? That were designed for search and rescue, rope access and and things like that. And nowadays, all that's different. You know, there are a whole variety of specialized tools to make our jobs hopefully easier, hopefully safer, hopefully more efficient. And we try to keep abreast of those and and update those systems when we can without making so many changes so rapidly that nobody knows how to do them yet. Yeah, it's a good it brings up a good point is how do you know when it's time to introduce a new piece of gear for the team? Well, the way we do it was we have a technical standards committee that their job is to keep abreast of those kinds of new techniques, new equipment, new devices. And they're that's staffed with our more experienced members that are that are in those industries outside of of Alpine and have enough perspective to know, it's not just the new shiny thing, but here's something that can really make a difference. And they have to weigh What difference can it can it make? And is it worth the effort of free training seventy people to to use this device or this technique? And and and that's gonna take a time all its own. You can't ever get all seventy people together in a room, train them one time. I mean, we each person needs multiple repetitions on anything to really learn it. So so transitioning a a real system can take a year. What is the what's the last big system you guys integrated? Probably a clutch is the one that comes to mind. Yeah, we also have, yeah, I think the clutch is probably the the the the best example of something that we've integrated and and slowly integrated it into hey it makes a big difference in this system. Let's get used to it here. Now that we understand how it works, let's bring it over into this system and transition how This system will work as well. And it that that always has a little bit of a a double edged sword because that means at some point we have two different things going on that it's a high line, we're gonna use the clutch. It's a lowering, we're gonna use this. We're getting into we have to do it deliberately. Yeah, and then you also have people that are trained in one, the other, and maybe both, so It's it goes back to that when do you when do you employ it? On the on the mission side and coordinating missions, when you are coordinating a mission, what information are you trying to obtain the first five minutes of a call? I'd I'd I'd be happy with accurate information. Right? I mean, you know, all all we really know is that that first bit of information is very likely only partially correct. And what we want to know right away, if we can, what's going on and where is it going on? Yeah, we we can hopefully determine very quickly, do you really need mountain rescue? And sometimes a lot of times the dispatchers can can filter that out. They know if it's a car accident on the highway, they don't need us. And if it's a a lost hiker on Mount Bearstead, they only need us. Other times it's it's not very clear, do you need the fire rescue people? Do you need ambulance? Do you need Alpine rescue team, do you just need law enforcement? And so in those cases they usually page all of us and we can hash it out as quickly as possible. But the the trick is always getting the most accurate information as quickly as we can. Yeah, and sometimes that might be on the fly, right? On it's absolutely on the fly. From areas that may have spotty, if any, cell coverage with somebody that quite often in a lot of cases, English is not their first language. It may not be any of their languages. And you know, while we're trying to drive up to the location from Denver. So we've we've adapted some of our processes. So we have mission coordinators that stay at home when it's not their shift, and they will talk to the reporting party, they'll talk to the subjects, whoever called nine one one, try to get the best information we can so we know. what resources we need, how many people we need, where to actually send them, and what the situation is. And if we need to call in assets that are outside of Alpha. And how do you guys integrate with the the rescue community or like fire rescue police? Or what does the what does that process look like? So in every county in Colorado, the sheriff is responsible for search and rescue. And they have usually have a Determine how that's gonna work. So in the counties that we work in, we're the search and rescue team for backcountry things. And we work with the fire departments and the emergency medical services in the those counties ahead of time. And so we've we hopefully cross train with them often enough that if there are those missions that really require everybody, we've already worked with each other. We're familiar with the systems and and in a lot of cases we also make sure that we use the same kinds of equipment. So when, you know, the I think the key is not doing anything that we do in a vacuum. So the the county services, especially in Clear Creek County, where we work most of the time, we work very closely with the fire service and the EMS, make sure that that we're just always on the same page. And if it's a mission that that requires this and not that they can stand down or we can stand down. If it's a remission that requires all of us, we're familiar with each other. We use the same equipment. And it doesn't matter if we're using their rope and our clutch or their clutch and our litter and our vacuum splint and their paramedics are integrated into our field teams and things like that. Yeah. It's all it's all pre planning and and Working out and a lot of that again is based on those missions that didn't go quite as smoothly as we hoped. Well, that's that's actually a great point. Is there a mission that you know or remember where, hey, plan A failed? You know, what what immediately happened then and how did what was the next step? trying to think of a mission where that didn't happen. You know, plan A is always maybe not even a capital A. But we I mean we had a mission where Flight for Life helicopter landed. To evacuate the subject and when they landed they they had a tail strike. And it w it wasn't serious enough that they didn't even really know immediately until the pilot got out and did his checklist of what they always do and found damage on the tail and the tail rotor. And he's like, okay, we're grounded. All right. Plan B is call an ambulance back. Get them at the trailhead and the litter is not stopping at the helicopter. It's going past the helicopter to the to the trailhead. And just being able to on the fly do those things and the dispatcher doesn't give you a bunch of questions. The ambulance isn't giving a bunch of questions. Field teams aren't given a bunch of questions. Why are we doing all why did this change? What are we doing now? Why why did we were gonna do this? Everybody's just like, all right. So we're So we shifted, we turned. And it's not the first time that's happened. It won't be the last time that's happened. it that's that's just kind of normal. And do you think that's do you think that's an important part of being a SART team member is that you have to be adaptable and kind of resilient to that, you know, it c and and can adaptability be trained? I think yeah, I think it it can be because it's it's sort of a road process of it has to be The they you have to learn it because it's gonna happen. And again, it comes back to we need to have members that can not only adapt to the change, but when they're out in the field, see that it needs to change and say something and and know the difference. That hey, this plan is working great. Maybe it's not the plan I would have thought of, or my preference would have been to do this, but hey, this is working fine. I'm I'm on the team, let's go. And you know what? This needs to change. Let's we all need to be flexible. So we need to that that that always that balance of following directions, following the path, and knowing when to speak up to say, I see something coming up that maybe other people do and they're not saying something, or maybe I'm the only one that sees it. But we I can see this the tide changing. How is that that's that's like that crew resource management? How are are people encouraged to say that? And how does that 'cause obviously you get into a group think mentality, nobody wants to step out of the norm. How do you influence people to step up? Are you what we've done is is specifically have trainings of we want people to do this. That hey, part of being a good team member is knowing that you can. And part of being a good team leader is being open to people in the field saying, Hey, I see something. So we we consciously try to instill that in our members. We consciously try to make sure that on both sides of this equation, the team leaders and the team members know that this is the expectation. And Unfortunately a lot of it will always come down to the personalities of the people involved. Yeah. And and we we try to we try to weed that out as much as we can, knowing that we can't get out of a hundred percent of it. Right. Yeah, at least if hopefully that one person will will say something when the time is is right. How long ago was it that the team integrated and started working with helicopters? Before I joined, I think. They've they've always been constantly increasing the involvement and as as they increase their capabilities, we've been hopefully taking more advantage of it. We're lucky that we have one local hospital here has the Flight for Life helicopters. It's the first air ambulance in the country. And they they have helybases not only in Denver but up in up in the mountains that are closer to where we have. So they have pilots and helicopters that are trained in the in the mountains. used to the high altitude, one thing we always remember is that helicopters are always a a sketchy, never a sure thing. And then add in twelve to fourteen thousand foot elevations and storms that can come out of nowhere. And that's that that that that object that was never a sure thing is even less of a sure thing. Even when it shows up. Yeah. And but as as their capabilities have increased, their Their ability to fly higher and faster and safer. Night vision goggles has have helped a lot. Yeah. And then the last few years, we've worked more with the Colorado National Guard. And there's a organization now called the Colorado Hoist Rescue Team that integrates the National Guard helicopters, both in Denver and in I think Eagle has the Army's high altitude training site with Search and rescue team members on the helicopters so that they can essentially get the best of both worlds at a at a scene and put put a helicopter that has high level capability and expert, maybe even beyond expert pilots, with experienced mountain rescuers that they can put on the ground that can evaluate the situation and know. Now of all these cards that I have in my deck, which is the one to play? That's been something probably the last six or seven years. Yeah, those are cool those are cool programs. The either the helicopter aquatic rescue or you got the hoist, those are just an incredible, incredible asset and Right. And being able to being able to integrate the military and civilians is I think new to both sides. And it's it's working out really well and I'm I'm I'm sure that the programs will continue and And spread to other other industries, other disciplines and other areas. And working working with aviation, you know, Alpine and Rescue side, what do you guys, what do you teach your team or that say they need to understand before working effectively with an aviation asset? I think a couple of things. Number one, that the aviation asset is is cool and is a great tool and is never going to be the only tool we employ. And Number two, that when that helicopter shows up, everything amps up a little bit. So be prepared for the the spike in adrenaline. Be prepared for the the per s at least the perceived urgency to ramp up. And when you're prepared for those things, then you can address them and hopefully not start just doing things extra fast and and getting focused on that helicopter that's over here and ignoring the loose rocks under your feet. Yeah, I think there was a video floating around. I forget where it came out of, but it was a mountain rescue going on and a helicopter had just come up and there was some rope, some loose rope that had been used by the team and it got kicked up real quick and almost got sucked into the into the rotor. I think the the main rotor system threw it into the tail rotor. Yeah. As I recall and in I think it was outside of Salt Lake City. Yeah, and that's that's the kind of stuff that happens, right? Hopefully not too often. Well, if you take your eye off the ball just because the shiny object is flown over exactly. Which I would be totally the the shiny object that is really loud. Yes and and really disruptive. And you know, like I said, it it just amps everything up and and you know, in the when all those holes in the Swiss cheese line up, bad things can happen and we're lucky that it wasn't worse. I mean it it took that asset out and and force them away to land to an emergency landing, but any other scenario would have been probably worse. Yeah, and I'm there you've seen the videos, I'm sure, of the helicopter rescues that have gone bad, you know, the helicopter crashes and while tr while trying to make that rescue. And you know, now that day has just gotten much worse. Yeah, right. And the the unfortunate fact is that some of the things we do are just inherently risky. And there's there's always a risk that something goes wrong. Yeah. No, and yeah, that's that's just a balance of the nature of the beast of SAR, I guess, right? It it is, exactly. you know, since your time on the team, obviously there's been even within the last couple of years, there's been a dramatic spike in GPS, cell phones, drones, mapping, all the modern communications. How is that you know, how has the team taken to all that in the in the past few years, especially recently? Recently we've done we've d we've done really good at at incorporating most of those things. Z cell phones and electronic mapping, that's how we navigate in the field nowadays. Our our command post vehicles will have map, the the computer map. Our our members very seldom take paper maps into the field anymore. We can send the map link to everybody on the team. They have it on their phone app and somebody on each field team is tracking. And there's so few areas left that don't have cell signal. anymore. And then and it's an ever receding area that especially with Starlink and you know all this new stuff. Right. We can track from the from the command post, we can track all of our field teams in real time. And that's that's an amazing thing. And we can track the the subject. We can send them if if they have a cell signal, which they do a lot of the time, we can send them a link. They click on the link in their in their messages and it puts their location on our map. No way. When I when I joined the team, it was really close to fifty percent searches and fifty percent rescues. Now it's more like eighty percent rescues and twenty percent searches. And those searches are not four or five days anymore. They're they're the long ones are generally six hours, including the drive time. And it's it is it's fundamentally changed the number of searches that we do. And do you think with drones, we're we're still a little bit behind the the state of the art in in our team, but other teams in the area are are really taking to that. The cost of entry into really high end drones is is pretty daunting and and it's difficult to to get over that hump of spending the money and then Putting those in the hands of drone operators that may or may not hit trees. It's it's not a matter of if it's when, right? It exactly. And it and it's not a it's not a slight on any of the operators. That's that's that's inherent in flying drones. And and it just it's gonna happen if you've if you haven't flown into if you haven't crashed a drone, you haven't been flying them enough and you you aren't good at them yet. Right? So we're we're still moving forward in that in that arena, but in a lot of the other ways, it when I joined the team in ninety six, it would have been inconceivable that a field team went in the field without a map and a compass and and plotting their position regularly on a paper map. Yeah, and I it's funny, do you think that The traditional navigation skills. Do you is that a worry for you at the next generation of the team? Or is that important anymore? I don't I don't really worry about it. I still think it it goes back to those fundamentals. You still need to know how to navigate yourself in the woods. And you still need to be comfortable with with with walking in the woods and just inherently knowing kind of what direction you were going and what direction you would need to go to come out. But the tools that you use to do that aren't aren't that important to me. And the the cell signals, the mapping, that that's all pretty redundant nowadays. That I don't really have concerns that suddenly your map isn't gonna work and you're sunk. You know, we used to worry about you always you always have to have a map with a GBS because your batteries are gonna die. Well, take extra batteries and you don't have to worry about. you make some of these systems redundant and now you don't need the map. You don't need the paper map. And and so we we actually train our new members on how to use Sartopo, not map and compass. Yeah, I was gonna say what what app do you use? Caltopo, the Yeah, the Sartopo portion of Caltopo. And you know, the the biggest benefit that we see there is that the other agencies around us all use the same thing. So the interoperability of that is a really game changer when we have other agencies, other search and rescue teams, the paramedics, the fire. We just say here here's a link to our map that has everything on it. And now they're part of the map. Yeah. That's a good common operating picture. Yep. That's the biggest asset. But the biggest benefit to that To me, one mapping software is the same as any others if use the one that you know how to use. But when when you work with a bunch of different agencies, being on the same one is is so useful. Yeah. What do you think the founders of the team would would think of where the team's at now and and just the you know with the technology and how far the team has come? I I think They they think the same thing that me in nineteen ninety six thinks that I can't believe that that this happened. The team started in nineteen fifty nine with with six or seven guys, and now it's it's seventy some, eighty some people with a headquarters building, a whole bunch of vehicles, eight year UTVs and snowmobiles and you know, nationally known Search and rescue experts in various disciplines that have influence over the National Mountain Rescue Association and have been a part of that. And we laughed a couple years ago that the team turned sixty five. man, when I turned sixty five, I'm retiring. The team turns sixty five, it's just no big deal. It's it's as strong as it ever was, and maybe stronger. Yeah. Yeah. Wait, and how does the you where are your do you have a central location that you everything moves at, like a cache, or how does that work? Yeah, we have a headquarters building right off I seventy west of Denver. And that that's where all our team vehicles, team equipment in the w in the summer we have wheeled UTVs side by sides. In the winter we put tracks on those UTVs, and then we have six snowmobiles. If if we ever get snow this winter, we're gonna use the snowmobiles. That was that was a big problem last year. And so we have I think three rescue vehicles plus a mobile command post, our training facility, or our we call it a shack, but it is anything but a shack. It has a classroom, a a meeting room. It's also now integrated with the Colorado Mountain Rescue History Center, which is getting off the ground to to to preserve the history of the last seventy plus years of People making a difference in Colorado. I'll check it out when I come out to Denver. Absolutely. Yeah. I'll be out there. Love to love to take give you a tour of that. I'm down. That with your your camera equipment so we can do the podcast. Yeah, we'll we'll do it on scene. We call that the recon edition. Absolutely. That's what we ought to do. We should plan that. it's gonna happen. It's definitely gonna happen. Now we do have to I do we have to acknowledge the fact that you were literally a rocket scientist. And I can say now that we've had a rocket scientist on the podcast, but Does that engineering side of the brain come with you when you're standing on the side of a mountain trying to solve a problem? Ab absolutely. Yeah. It it it it does. The the engineering brain does. And I can honestly say that the rescue brain comes with me to work as well. And and I'm I'm constantly impressed with how those two worlds collide so usefully that That me being mountain rescuer has made me a better engineer, better rocket scientist and a and a a better employee at my company. And having an engineering degree and and experience and that kind of mind makes me a better rescuer. Yeah, and if you're from the engineer side and seeing it both sides, when you're looking at a a complicated rope system, are you thinking about how it works or are you thinking how can it fail? Is that an engineering thing only? That's what every rope rescuer should be doing, right? Yeah, I no, I think I think Yeah, every rescuer should be looking at that system. And both how how am I going to utilize this and what are the weak points of it? For me, I look at it, what are the what are the individual components of it? Because even a really complex system, you break it down to the simple pieces. The the the pulleys are pretty simple. Carabiners are incredibly simple, and we all know how the rope works. And if you can if you can tie the knot around the tree or the rock to make the anchor, and you can use the brake device and feed it properly and you understand where the rope goes and how the friction of where you're going is either going to help you or going to hurt you. And and what happens down at the litter and are we going to tie our people in or not? And what are the implications of all that? Each one of those little pieces is pretty simple. And if you think of it that way, even the agglomeration of all of those things can be pretty simple. But if you if you come in green, all you see is a whole thing together. And it seems very complex. Yeah, take it a minute to break I that's unfortunately my problem. I I just overcomplicate things when it comes to but I an interesting and it you kind of touched on it a little bit and Especially our the municipal fire side and trying to build these teams, these rescue teams or tech rescue teams, it can be incredibly difficult just because, you work different shifts, you might never see the other people that you're, are on your team. But the engineering side of, from where you come, a system isn't really validated until it's tested, right? Or it's it should be tested, it should know how it's worked. How can a rescue how can rescue organizations think about capability that same way? Well, I think the key for us. is making sure when we're when we are doing training, it's not just one training. It is a series of doing the same training multiple times. And and we can have multiple trainers do it. They they can have their own spin on how they explain things and how they their mannerisms and how they are a trainer, but they all have to be consistent in what the message is and how we use the clutch, how we use the the brick tube and how the litter is gonna be tied into whatever what systems are we gonna use, how are where are we gonna put the pulleys in which system? And and what do we call the system? Is it a Z rig? Is it a three to one? Well, we're gonna use the term fill in the blank. And when we say that, this is what we mean. And and that's the key is that if I go to train next week, I get taught something. If I go the same training in a month, I'm not taught a different way of doing it. I'm taught the same thing. Cause there's gonna be different people there. And it just takes time to make sure that all of our members get the same training. And we may not we are likely not gonna all be at the same training all the time. It's the same on our side. It's the yeah, it's the it's the persistence and the and the patience to make sure before we really put this system under fire that we're all familiar with it and that we're all on the same page. Exactly. I think that's and it's stress testing before the actual call out. Right. Yeah. Knowing that knowing the team is capable. Exactly. It's the same thing we do with the rocket. You know, you qualify the pieces, you make sure that That you've you've put it through a little harder environment than it's gonna see when it launches. And so that when it launches, you have confidence that I know it's been through worse than this. I know all the pieces work. We've even tested them all together. All we gotta do is light the candle and off it goes. That's right. The tech rescue rocket. That's right. That's it. That's it. Yeah, you've been, you've you've been on lots of roles in this in the Alpine Rescue team being the training director, member director, equipment director, mission coordinator, board member. Which role which roles taught you the most about building an organization? I think the to me it was the training director. That was the one where I felt like I had the the responsibility of of putting all these people on the same page. And it was the role so far that I've had That was just relentless. I could organize a training for this Wednesday. And as soon as that training started on seven o'clock Wednesday night, my job started for the next week. Okay, so what are we doing next? And that one's done. What are we doing next? What are we doing next? And the weight of I can't just, you know, phone it in because the the the training that we do this week. is what's gonna pay off in a month or next year or something. And I never wanted to go to a mission thinking that the training let us down. That's that's where it felt like the pressure was on the most. Now I have as a mission coordinator, I'm responsible for mission, I'm responsible for what happens. And that's that's a weight all its own as well. But I also know that I don't ever have to do it alone. We have other mission coordinators that are always going to be there to help. We're a we're usually going to work missions together. And he's going to think of things that I didn't think of. He's going to remember things that I don't remember. He's going to have maybe some more current knowledge of the conditions of the snow or lack of snow. So that these resources are what we really want today, or well, these are the resources we don't need. So don't bring the small wheels because there's not enough snow to to to run a or after the big snow we got, yeah, this this pathway if we say on the north side of things, we do want the soil wheels or something like that. And that the we d we just don't have to run missions on our own anymore. Yeah. Yeah. And that I think it's it's better that sense having a maybe that not a backup, but having that other trained individual just to be there and and have and have your back. Right. Yeah. He knows what needs to be done just as much as I do. And he doesn't even have to I don't have to tell him to do things. He just knows that you know what? I'm gonna call and get a weather forecast so Steve can deal with putting the field teams together and briefing the field teams. And then when I take a breath, he's like, Hey, here's what I got from interviewing this person, from getting the the weather I've called the talk to the other guys that just came out of the field, here's what we learned. It's just spreading the spreading the knowledge out and it's not quite rescue by committee, but it's it's like you said, the crew crew resource management thing. And using that effectively is is what makes it different. It's a force multiplier. Yeah. It really is. Yeah. what do you think destroys rescue team culture faster than maybe anything else? Not having missions, I think. This is what we we haven't had to deal with that for a while. But that's that seems to be one of the things that that that can hurt. You get the wrong person in charge. You know, if it comes down to like I said, it's it's a it's a machine that has a lot of moving parts. And each one of those parts is is important. And if you get a leader We we pr a president or a field director, we call the the the person in charge of the operations the field director. It's like a COO. You get somebody in there that it just has his own ideas of how to do things, doesn't listen to input, he can he can destroy morale. When they when they listen to input and and we've we've had great luck in this for basically the last thirty years or more, it it takes a consensus on how to operate the team to the most professional level. So you get the if you get the wrong personality in the wrong spot, it can destroy morale, can destroy the team. But to me the the the biggest thing that when the when the team is in turmoil, it's because we don't have missions. Yeah. And we you know once in a while we have these times like, all we need is just a mission. We just need a search where we can just all Walk out in the woods together. Yeah. It's the same on the fireside. Sometimes you just need a little fire to get get the everyone on the same page. Right. it's a it's like a thunderstorm that comes through and clears things out. Right. Yeah. Nowadays we don't really have those issues anymore because we are pretty consistently busy. like I said, I think in in July, in the thirty one days of July, we had thirty five missions. And that they may not be a lot for a a fire department. But for a search and rescue team, that's a lot. And and it never comes one per day. It's you get a few days off and then you get five. Sometimes three at the same time. And how does the team handle that? Well, our team is big enough that and we have multiple mission coordinators that if I'm running a mission and we get a a second call during that mission, we say, Hey, Tom, can you can you take this mission? He calls dispatch and finds out what's going on. Okay, it's this kind of mission. This is these are the resources I need. These are the resources I need on this mission. We have enough, usually. And if we don't, we call mutual aid. And and that's the one thing that is always nice is that I always feel like as a mission coordinator, I have virtually limitless resources at my at my fingertips if I need I can I can make the call. to the the the Colorado organization that can get the Blackhawk helicopter overhead with the hoist. I can call other our neighboring teams and they'll send people. I can call for paramedic, an ambulance. If I need law enforcement for some reason, I can call dispatch and they'll send a a sheriff's deputy up there as quickly as possible if if they're aren't already there. If I need search dogs, if I need swift water rescue, whatever it is Or they're a radio call away. And most of the things, even simultaneous missions, we can usually handle with the people that we have. 'Cause our team is big enough to do that. We have enough equipment and vehicles to do that. But if we need to get on the radio and cavalry comes. Yeah. It's a great feeling. Yeah. Yeah. We we never have to feel like we're out there on the sharp end without backup. Yeah. That's that's a good that's a good problem to have, I guess. Yeah. Right. Exactly. And that's that's a healthy search and rescue community in the state. Yes. The infrastructure is all there and it works. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. That's that's good. What is something the the fire service or tech rescue can learn from mountain mountain rescue or mountain rescue teams? That's a good question. I don't yeah, that's that that's interesting because I'm not I'm not all that familiar with the fire service side of things. So I can tell you what we've learned and And it's is it the things that can that they can learn? Maybe. But the the the key is getting a strong team, not a bunch of strong individuals. You know, I'd I'd rather have that that group that works together to do the basic fundamentals really well than for people that can climb five fourteen rock routes. You know, they Sometimes we need that skill, but that's very seldom. Yeah. What we need. Yeah, it is. Yeah. I wish I could do it. But what we need ninety-nine or percent or more of the time is an effective team. People that get along together, that that know their job, that have the skills to do multiple jobs. That if if somebody's having a bad day and just having a brain fart and can't tie the knot, right. Somebody jumps in and ties the knot and doesn't hound them, doesn't make them feel like they're two feet tall. Makes them empowers them to, you know what, it's not your day. How about you do this job and I'll do this? Well, just swap this. And you can be effective over here. You don't need to kill yourself to do this knot. You don't need to, rig them. Looking out for your teammates properly. Yeah. Right. Look out for your teammates. And realize that. that they're looking out for you. And that's that's what any any group, whether it's fire or EMS or search and rescue or building rockets just needs. I'll I'll leave you with this last question. If you could teach the next generation of rescuers only one lesson, something that might someday save you know a victim, a teammate, or themselves, what would it be? I think it's the keep your North Star. Know that number one is your safety, number two is your teammates' safety, number three is the subject. Don't make things worse. Don't put yourself in in a situation where you compromise number one, number two. You do those things and you're successful. Belly, but listen. I hope so. Well, we appreciate your time today and learn a little bit. of course. And I think We're not done here. We we have some work to do out in Denver this fall. Absolutely. Love to have c come up for a a recon session. Yes, we'll we'll make that happen. But from the rescue lab and and the listeners want to say thank you for letting us hear about the Alpine Rescue Team. And we look forward to more, Steve. Thank you very much. I appreciate your time, TJ. Thanks for having me. And everybody else, stay tuned for the next one. Thanks for listening to the Rescue Lab. If you found value in today's conversation and want to help strengthen the rescue community Consider supporting the New England Rescue Collaborative Foundation. Every donation helps fund technical rescue scholarships, training opportunities, and educational incentives that prepare rescuers before the next call comes in. You can learn more or make a tax-deductible donation at NE Rescue Collaborative. And one last favor, if you enjoy the Rescue Lab, the best way to help us grow is by leaving a five-star review on your favorite podcast platform. It helps more rescuers discover these conversations and keeps us bringing you stories and lessons from some of the world's best rescue professionals. Until next time, keep learning, keep training, and remember, no one else is coming, it's up to us. I'm PJ Halloran and this is the Rescue Lab.