Penticton Search and Rescue wants you

PENTICTON – If you want to be the first person people call in an emergency, then Penticton Search and Rescue wants to hear from you.

Training officer Mike Porter says with retirements of several long time leaders in the organization, they could use about a dozen more people to help make sure the team can respond to emergencies, as it did Monday.

The team joined with Central Okanagan Search and Rescue to find an overdue cyclist who left Kelowna on Saturday for a ride to Naramata. While the 60-year-old man got out on his own, it's a good example of a typical call out, one of roughly 30 call outs per year.

Porter is in financial services and business so being part of search and rescue offers something entirely different in his life.

“It’s just so much different than my day job and the skills that I have learned will stay with me forever," he says in a release. "I would have never dreamed that I’d be on specialty teams doing Technical Rope Rescue, Swift Water, Ice Rescue and HETS (Helicopter External Transport System). However I know its not that everyone wants to do all of this, but for me it’s just so challenging and rewarding helping others and providing a critical rescue service to our community.

The team expects new members to train weekly on Monday nights to maintain skills and knowledge. 

"From a team perspective, new people bring enthusiasm and new skills, and with our call volumes increasing due to more and more people enjoying what the Okanagan has to offer outdoors, we need a strong standby roster in order to provide this much needed service in the region," Porter says.

If you are interested, email Pentictonsar@gmail.com and ask for an application package.

To contact the reporter for this story, email Steve Arstad at sarstad@infonews.ca or call 250-488-3065. To contact the editor, email mjones@infonews.ca or call 250-718-2724.