Kamloops Search and Rescue has some new gear thanks to a group of Beattie school students

KAMLOOPS – After raising hundreds of dollars, elementary school students are providing search and rescue team members a warm place to sleep.

Beattie Elementary School students in Beth Morgan’s Grade 6 and 7 class raised more than $600 to purchase high quality sleeping bags for the Kamloops Search and Rescue team to use if they have to sleep in the forest on an operation. Team member Mike Ritcey, who was on hand to receive the donation with search dog Juno, thanked the class.

“You have to hand it to the kids,” he says. “It’s a pretty good deal.”

The class presented search and rescue team members with three sleeping bags. They had originally only been able to afford two, but the outdoors retailer, Atmosphere, added a third.

After thanking the class, Ritcey and Juno showed the kids some search and rescue equipment and how a search dog finds items.

The sleeping bags will replace old ones Ritcey says were ‘pretty poor.’

“We’ll put them into a drop bag,” he says. “It has a tent, now it has three sleeping bags, and it’s got a cooking stove.”

The bag is used if rescuers are dropped somewhere by a helicopter and aren’t sure if they’ll make it out quickly. They can also put a patient in one to keep them warm.

The money was raised as part of the Junior Achievement British Columbia’s A Business of Their Own program. The not-for-profit organization helps teach 30,000 students business skills each year in the province.

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