Aldrich Mtns.

We spent last week training in the Aldrich mountains west of town. It is a great opportunity to practice what we preach, or as the saying around the base goes, "Work like you train and train like you work." While it snowed and/or rained on us every day, it was a very successful week of experiential learning filled with saw training, PT, SAR and medical scenarious, PT, line digs, live fire training, and oh yeah, more PT. Camping in the woods for a week is also a great way to start the ever important crew cohesion process. The program is a great way to shake the cobwebs off, gain some valuable training and evaluate the rookies.

Day Two

Day two is over. Looks like a really good rookie class this year. Fit and motivated. It brings back a lot of memories from when I showed up not knowing what to expect last year. Its a lot different being the returning vet! I'm very much looking forward to the rest of the season.
Our first helicopter showed up today, a Bell 205A++, which is basically a souped up civilian version of the Huey. Looks like a great ship and I can't wait to fly in it.

Another Season

After another successful season of prescribed fire with The Nature Conservancy of Arkansas (and a consequent 6 months of blog neglect) I'm back out in John Day, OR for another season on the Malheur Rappel Crew. Do I still have any readers? Probably not. Oh well. I'll try to keep the blog up to date this summer with fires etc. but if you want more info check me out on Facebook. Yeah, I finally gave in and signed up this fall. Work starts tomorrow! PT test, pack test, paperwork and more. Looks like rain so it should be interesting.