Sean C. Morgan
When you’re lost in the outdoors, the key to survival is preparedness and some basic skills to stay alive and help search crews locate you.
That’s the primary topic for an eight-hour wilderness survival class to be taught April 16 by Tim Chase, an adviser with the Linn County Search and Rescue Team. The class is four hours in the classroom and four hours in the field.
“The focus is on preparedness and basic survival skills, not the primitive living or anything like that,” Chase said. Survival skills are important for those who spend time in the outdoors, such as backpackers and hikers, mushroom pickers and even drivers.
From the search and rescue perspective, they need to stay alive long enough for teams to find them, Chase said. Priorities include shelter, signaling and fire. Water is included in the discussion, but “in Western Oregon, getting water isn’t terribly difficult.”
Chase also will discuss survival psychology, he said, “just helping people prepare mentally for when they do get into a bad situation.”
He will share stories and tips he has gleaned from his own training and experience to help outdoorsmen understand how to deal with the extra stress of being in a survival situation.
The class won’t discuss food preservation, he said. It isn’t really necessary. Some 95 percent of search and rescue situations are resolved within 24 hours. Almost all of the rest are resolved within three days.
“It’s really keeping yourself alive and helping search and rescue find you,” Chase said. With proper preparation and leaving trip plans behind, a search and rescue becomes an issue of one or two days, three maximum.
Linn County Sheriff’s Office conducts five to 10 searches per year in the county, Chase said. The Linn County team also assists on approximately double that amount in other counties.
Chase served in the U.S. Navy for three years. He went to work for the Linn County Sheriff’s Office as a maintenance man at Linn County Jail in 1997 and became an adviser with the Search and Rescue Team about four years ago.
“I’ve always been an outdoors-type person – hiking, backpacking,” Chase said. Once he got a chance to participate in a search, “ever since then, I’ve been hooked.”
The cost of the class is $41 through the Linn-Benton Community College Sweet Home Center. Call (541) 367-6901 for more information or to register.