Nothing beats field training, and in the winter that means snow, cold and mountainous terrain for search and rescue teams.
The Weber County Sheriff's Department hosted a 2 1/2-day area conference last weekend in Ogden Valley, near North Fork Park, where three feet of snow still blanketed the ground.More than 50 search and rescue team members representing Weber, Morgan, Box Elder, Davis, Sanpete and Cache counties were there, as well as a few from Idaho.
Some FBI officers and Forest Service officials were also at the conference.
According to Weber County Sheriff Art Haney, who helped organize the event, training is only going to become more intensive in the next few years to prepare for the upcoming 2002 Winter Games.
Haney expects some extra rescue problems when thousands of people visit Utah for the Games and yet are unfamiliar with the area when they inevitably go out on their own.
"It'll become more and more intense," Haney predicted. "We get a call a week in the winter now."
The weekend conference included classroom training as well as outdoor instruction - winter gear, winter survival, first aid, compass and land navigation, snowshoeing and shooting.
One portion of the training included burying a transceiver as if were a person covered by an avalanche and having rescue teams find it in less than four and a half minutes.
The bulk of the conference-goers were volunteers, who Haney hoped left realizing any obstacle can be overcome with the proper attitude and training.
Besides being able to find, help and rescue victims faster in the winter, Haney said the training also makes it safer for the rescue teams themselves.
They'll know what to do in a sudden blizzard or white-out conditions.
"They learn how to use the surroundings to their benefit," he said.
Another big benefit of the conference is that Weber County volunteers learned how to work with their counterparts from surrounding counties.
Monte Cristo is the state's largest snowmobile trailhead and sits in Weber County, but its vast trails cross into Cache and Morgan counties, too. Tri-county rescue cooperation is essential.
Haney said Weber County has also developed a model special forces program - the extreme team - that's now being duplicated in other Utah counties.
This crack team chooses seven to 10 members from each county specialty group - jeep patrol, mounted posse, climbers, divers, etc. Team members become prepared to go out for 24 hours at a time without any assistance to do what is necessary to rescue missing or injured people.
Haney said when rescues involve children, the elderly or an injured person, the extreme team is always called on.
The conference didn't signal an end to winter training. Weber County will conduct below the ice diving at Pineview Reservoir as well as snowcat training at Monte Cristo next weekend.
Weber County does it on a tight budget - just $4,000 a year - with the help of volunteers, fund raisers and donations.