"The Colorado Rapid Avalanche Deployment(C-RAD) is a growing 501(c)3 organization with over seventy members, C-RAD exists to cultivate, inspire, and produce dog teams for successful avalanche search and rescue in the mountains of Colorado. These volunteer teams combine traditional search and rescue methods with specialized avalanche deployment systems to expedite rescue of avalanche victims. "(c-rad.org)
"We are a volunteer group who work our day jobs as ski patrollers, guides, and in other outdoor professions, and do this in addition to those jobs. Though a live find has not been had from an avalanche in North America, the closure that finding a victim brings to the family is immeasurable." – Doug Lesch, C-RAD President My interested in avalanche rescue dogs came a few years after I started ski patrol. The initial spark was, 'Wait, I could work with a dog everyday?!' Which turned out to be true but it meant a lot more than just having a furry friend to hang around with at work.
Becoming a candidate for an Avalanche Rescue Dog Team meant "putting in my time" by doing the non-glamour work like digging deep snow caves, ski packing large areas, and being buried in the snow multiple feet down as a victim for rescue drills for the dogs. "Putting in your time" as a candidate lead to taking the role Avalanche Technician which is the third member of a dog team. An Avi. Tech. wears many hats for these teams. Communications coordinator, investigator, detective and shoveler are just some of those hats. Occupying the Avi. Tech. position for a few years helped me observe dog handling and training techniques. Becoming a Dog handler taught me so much. It meant building a relationship with a canine based on trust, loyalty, discipline and love. Building a common language with a canine also proved to take patience and practice. This not so short list of words, hand signals and a lot of body language mades communication with a canine at a distance possible. In 2015, Anchin pictured to the right, became Monarch Ski Patrol's first-ever C-RAD Certified Avalanche Rescue Dog. This is a major accomplishment for any dog team. The standard for the certification test is a dog team is given 20 minutes to search for 1-3 victims in a 100 meter by 100meter area of varying snow depth and terrain. I believe that this a valuable resource to have in the mountains and thats why I continue to stay active with C-RAD and I have started to train my own 4 month old Border Collie/Golden retriever as my next potential avalanche rescue dog. Below I talk viewers through a quick dog search demonstration. |
Colo. Springs news station feature story: www.youtube.com/watch?v=V0ovr6VBWdE&feature=youtu.be
Article I am featured in: https://www.coloradocountrylife.coop/doggone-heroes-colorados-avalanche-dogs/ |