Missing Child in Mo found and SAR ?'s

[acurajane]

Ok so I was reading how a child was lost and then found in the woods. Ok, last yr a couple who were riding with their 2 yr old in a horse buggy lost the child cause the horse flipped out and the child went flying.

I know that there are plenty of SAR people in this state, and why did nobody contact one? Do people not know about the SAR teams?

Specifically for this reason I am wanting to train my Lab pup Chevy for SAR.

[Amaruq]

It varies from place to place. The way it SHOULD work is a call goes into 911 and the call the appropriate SAR people in to do the work. However, there are a lot of places that do not have any organized SAR teams and even fewer that utilize dog teams. A team would not just be called out by anyone. Well they shouldn't be anyway. It is a lot more complex than many people understand and there is a whole lot of politics involved as well.

[jocoyn]

I think it is very complex

There are a large number of SAR teams who really don't put in the necessary work and they do things like contact the family, the press, just "show up" etc. We have seen some of that "freelancers" etc. and they make the LE skittish when they see these folks mangling up scenes and diverting their energies from the job at hand.

That kind of nonsense hurts the legitimate teams because it gives the impression everyone is that way. And it seems to be growing.

People can even get the "certifications" out the wazoo and that may not be an indication of quality. Certifications are necessary but I have seen too many dogs with a peice of paper who were not "all that".

I think the better teams have worked very hard to work one on one relationships in advance with the folks who may call them out, train with them, act professional and only field competent teams. That is often done one county at a time and it can take many years for that relationship to develop into a strong working bond.

IF I were managing a search and I knew there was a "dog team" somewhere I probably would not call them in unless I really knew about their capabilities. Unprepared searchers and well meaning volunteers can redirect an entire search effort to a rescue mission for someone on the SAR team

[pupresq]

When we were in DC I noticed a lot of variability in what the different teams required. I saw some folks at SAR-ex things that I couldn't believe were operational. But on the other hand, many of the teams had excellent reputations and our team got called out a lot. I haven't joined a SAR team since moving to KY but I'm hoping to soon. There is one locally that as far as I know is a good team so I'm not sure what the issue is, but I routinely see stories on the local news that seem absolutely perfect for an area search dog team (child/elderly person wanders out of backyard into woods etc) and yet they're never deployed. Instead you've got local people (not LE professionals) looking for them on ATVs. Which is fine, but it just seems like a dog team would probably have better luck.

[windwalker718]

Sometimes the "officials" are a touch slow. I used to work @ a State institution and occasionally a patient would go missing. The 1st thing that was done was a massive search of the wooded 1000 acres around the place. Often it was the 2nd or 3rd day before they brought in the State Police Dog teams to search. After 300+ people had tramped over the search area. *sigh*

[Catu]

Originally Posted By: Nancy J

People can even get the "certifications" out the wazoo and that may not be an indication of quality. Certifications are necessary but I have seen too many dogs with a peice of paper who were not "all that".

Worse, I've seen too many handlers that are not "all that". They may have the better dogs, but they do not have the preparation, knowledge nor physical condition to attend an emergency. Too many handlers that could loose more than a few pounds and you know they won't be able to endure 8 daily hours in a rough terrain without putting themselves in danger. Too many handlers that do not even know how to set their own backpacks, even less to carry a wounded victim in a stretcher for 5 miles.

[acurajane]

Thank you everyone and I do understand what each reply brought to the table. I was just curious. I do want to get invovled and do it the proper way.

[jocoyn]

Originally Posted By: Windwalker18 Often it was the 2nd or 3rd day before they brought in the State Police Dog teams to search. *

After 3 days you start planning a recovery mission while still searching and holding out hoping they are still alive [statistics are on the bad side but sometimes amazing things happen]

[acurajane]

With both incindents that I refered to, both children were found ok. Thank the Lord for that. I know that if something happened to my kids that I would want all means neccessary to help

[jocoyn]

Ok someone on another board - a closed SAR board indicated they were working on the IC and they indicated horses, dogs, etc. as working the scene. Apparently the terrain was extremely treacherous with predators abounding. Amazing story. Temps in the 40s at night and rain.

Often times the dog teams don't get mentioned in the press. We have even had live finds that got covered but the dogs were not mentioned. That's ok. It was not a dog handler that found him though.