CASARA - Lethbridge

Training Update

2012-02-06T13:42:00.004-08:00

Well, after a very busy Saturday, I am very happy to announce that CASARA Lethbridge now has three more certified Search and Rescue Spotters bringing our total to number to 12. CASARA Lethbridge also has 7 of our Spotters well on their way to becoming Navigators. I really need to say that I am very very proud of how amazingly well this has taken off. We are receiving many fine accolades from our friends in CASARA Calgary and you can bet we are putting Lethbridge on the map once more. As I look ahead we are going to have a busy year. We are budgeting with Calgary to plan a monthly exercises and may have our own training budget in the near future. To certify the Nav trainees we will need a total of 21 hours of flight time. Along the way we will all be honing our spotters skills, doing some ELT ground training and somewhere we need to stop and have some pot lucks or BBQ's. I think we are doing Lethbridge proud. I am planning in the near future to ask Lethbridge Living Magazine to do a article on CASARA Lethbridge as a way of public awareness. All of your hours of training and practice are volunteer hours and that's an important public service. It goes without saying the plane rides are not too bad either. Please note the link on the upper right to some pictures of our training day.

Special thank you to our good friends at EXCEL FLIGHT Training for the use of your classroom and sort of taking over your space with our numbers. We also thank AIR WEST Flight Services for taking care of our planes and pilots.

And last but certainly not least, a big THANK YOU to CASARA Calgary for making the training and the CASARA presence in Lethbridge a possibility. Thanks to Gary, Dwight, Denis, Warren, Dave, Fred and Darcy.

I would also like to thank Dale and Rob and Mr. Peterson on who's farms we were able to place our search targets.

Navigator / Spotter Training Feb 2012

2012-02-03T21:50:00.000-08:00

Seven of our certified spotters have decided to take the Navigation Course through CASARA.

On Jan 6, 2012 we got together for the first time to start the process of becoming Navigators.

Al, Brian, Elaine, Larry, Lauretta, Marty and Sandi started with the slideshow presentation followed by map info, plotting lat long, laying out search patterns, in short learning a lot of new information for some and a review for others. We met again on Jan 24 and completed the course on Jan. 31. How comes the hard part. While we can plot a search pattern we now face the task of trying to keep an airplane on course following that pattern. The goal will be four individual flight each of different search tracks and doing this in a manner that is within 600 feet of the search track we are to be following. This requires an excellent pilot and good communication so that both the pilot and the navigator are of one mind. Sounds like a challenge. Tomorrow is Feb. 4, 2012 and it's the day we get to try out the knowledge we have gained in the past weeks. Good Luck guys. Tomorrow is also a Spotter training day. Stephaine, Dave and Nader will be able to gain the flight time to become certified spotters. Many of us well also be able to get in a refresher spotter flight to keep us current with the requirements of the CASARA standards.

The great thing in all this is that Lethbridge is well on it's way to re-certification to hopefully regain it's former status as Zone # 1 in Alberta. That would be a very good situation. It will most certainly take some of the pressure off of CASARA Calgary volunteers.

Books, Patches and Wings

2011-10-28T09:10:00.000-07:00

Oct. 27, 2011

At the Lethbridge Sport Flyers Annual General meeting, I was please to be able to hand out the log books, patches, wings and pins to Larry, Elaine, Al, Sandy, Lauretta and Ed, six of the newly certified nine, CASARA Lethbridge Spotters. I have received my log book already. These members are also members of the LSF and I was proud to be able the present the certification in front of our fellow members and I believe everyone is happy to see a CASARA presence in Lethbridge once more. Brian and Emery are also certified spotters and will receive their wings, books and patches ASAP.

We still have some work to do, Nader and Stephaine will need classroom training. Dwight needs two more flights and Jason and Dave need the final flight. Hopefully we can do the classroom ASAP and get a plane do so everyone can be certified. Once this is done we can start to look at navigation and hopefully pilots. First Aid training is being looked into. I am also looking at some general public awareness by getting our group in local print.

On another note, you will have noted the CASARA cap, I made a link to CASARA merchandise on the upper right side of the blog. New caps are being looked into as these have the button and may be uncomfortable with a headset when flying. All merchandise can be ordered directly by CASARA members. As for the possible new caps I'll keep you posted.

Please also feel free to post to this blog, just send me the article and I'll post it. I will set this blog so you can post directly very soon.

Marty CZCLC CASARA Zone Commander Lethbridge / Calgary

Welcome to CASARA Lethbridge

2011-06-19T17:42:00.000-07:00

Welcome to CASARA Lethbridge

CASARA Lethbridge Sector is new to the CASARA Calgary Zone family.

CASARA stands for Civil Air Search And Rescue Association. CASARA consists of provincial links in BC, AB, SK, MB, ONT, QC and Nova Scotia. Many provinces are divided into sectors and Alberta is no exception. Alberta has several zones and Lethbridge is at the start of one day establishing itself as a zone once more.

This all began with contact being made at a Fly In breakfast in Medicine Hat. Larry and I flew from Coaldale and met the reps from CASARA that were in for the day to promote CASARA. I also serve on the executive of the Lethbridge Sport Flyers a local flying club and suggested we invite CASARA to speak to the club at a monthly meeting. The invite was sent and CASARA Calgary responded with an excellent presentation of what they do. Next was to send out an email to the membership of the LSF's and see who may be interested in becoming active members of CASARA.

The result was that 12 individuals directly connected to the LSF's decided to take the training to become spotters for CASARA. Two more individuals also signed on and the stage was set to get the show on the road.

-mn

Training Day

2011-06-19T10:16:00.000-07:00

On Friday evening June 18, the first training event was held for the new Lethbridge CASARA trainees. Dwight and Dave from CASARA Calgary held a three hour informational class and introduced many of us to CASARA for the first time. Thirteen individuals went through the class with the plan to do two hours of flight training the next day.

Our thanks to Excel Flight School (Roland) for donating the use of his classroom for the training evening.

Saturday .. Flight Training

The day started at 9:45 am with three teams of two "spotters in training", a navigator and pilot soon in the air and off to the various targets and ELTs . In this two hour flight the new spotters put into practice the lessons of the previous evening and did their best to locate the ground targets. There were three target areas and two ELTs to find. The ELTs or Emergency Locator Transmitter is a radio beacon carried aboard all certified aircraft in Canada.

The training day also consisted of ground location training as well. Two vehicles with the remaining trainees were dispatched from the Lethbridge Airport with equipment used to locate the target ELT's. The morning teams located both ELT targets and all includiing the flights returned to the Air West hangar for lunch and debriefing. In the afternoon the ground teams took the air training and the Air team took the ground training.

Twelve individuals were put through the training exercise and are well on their way to becoming fully certified CASARA spotters. The next step is to arrange for one more flight training day where we one more hour of spotter training. Soon stay tuned.

Thanks again to Excel Flight School for the use of their classroom on Saturday and also to Air West Flight Services who cared for the needs of the CASARA team of pilots.
Thanks also to the CASARA training team, Pilots; (Gary, Dwight, and Denis) Navigators; (Norm, Fred and Warren) and ground trainer; (Dave) from CASARA Calgary.

mn

Training Day Photo

2011-06-17T10:43:00.000-07:00

What were we looking for ?

2011-06-16T10:57:00.000-07:00

Assisting CASARA Calgary with targeting

2011-06-14T13:35:00.000-07:00

CASARA Lethbridge assisted the Calgary CASARA team with training on Sept. 10, 2011 by placing a target and ELT. Thanks to Fletcher aerodrome for allowing the placement and aiding in the training. Apparently only one team found the target but that is the way things happen. It is very hard to spot things from the air. In the training plane you are about 500 ft. up and are moving along at about 150 mph based on the ground.

The Training Continues

2011-06-13T08:57:00.000-07:00

We jump ahead to Oct 1, 2011 and the final step of training for many of the CASARA spotters from Lethbridge and the surrounding area. Arrangements were made to have two aircraft fly down from Calgary for this final day of spotter training. Part of the ops side of training was to place two targets in the surrounding area and to hunt out these by flying search patterns in the ares where the target were located. After arranging the crew tasking the training was ready to go. Gary and Dennis and two navigators arrived in Lethbridge about 9 am on the Saturday, Oct 1 and the first and second of five flights were in the air by 10:15. Dwight, Larry, Brian and Elaine were on the first flights. After lunch Ed, Sandra, Lauretta and Al were airborne for flights three and four. The day ended with Emery and myself, Martin on flight number five.

Congratulations to Larry, Brian, Elaine, Ed, Sandra, Lauretta, Al, Emery and to me also for achieving the positions of active CASARA Spotters. We have successfully joined a group of about 2650 volunteers who carry out search and rescue missions across Canada.

CASARA Lethbridge wishes to thank Excel Flight Training for their classroom facilities and also Air West for looking after our pilots needs.

More Trainees

2011-05-03T18:33:00.000-07:00

Dec. 3, 2011

Today two more individual received Spotter Training. Nader and Stephaine sat in on the three hour course of information, knowledge and practical lessons of the CASARA training. The next step is to have the flight training which is the real hands on application of what is learned in the classroom.

Thanks once again to Roland of Excel Flight Training for the use of the classroom at the Air West Building.