Misc Pictures
Targets at Chin
March 16 Training Day Lethbridge Airport
CASARA Lethbridge ( Calgary Zone 2 )
Some Highlights:
Lethbridge CASARA how has 15 active members. Of the 15 we have 14 certified spotters, 11 certified military spotters and 5 certified navigators. Training has been both challenging and fun. The support from CASARA Calgary has been outstanding. I wanted to include a random sampling of pictures from variuos training days. Enjoy !
Lethbridge CASARA how has 15 active members. Of the 15 we have 14 certified spotters, 11 certified military spotters and 5 certified navigators. Training has been both challenging and fun. The support from CASARA Calgary has been outstanding. I wanted to include a random sampling of pictures from variuos training days. Enjoy !
The above were taken during Military Spotter training !
Western Canada SAREX in Cranbrook, BC.
Training Day in Vulcan Airport
The type of targets we look for sometimes.
Oct 13/12 Lethbridge (New certified Navigators)
This time we were back in Lethbridge put together another good exercise. We had Larry, Al and Sandy receive Navigator Certifications. Elaine, Lauretta and Marty also got in a Nav training flight each and need just one more day to complete the Nav training. Ed, Lloyd and James a new spotter trainee all had some more spotter flights.
I am so proud of the Lethbridge team. From our first CASARA flight on June 19, 2011 we have made some excellent progress.
Lethbridge now has 15 members with two more coming on the team in November. We have 13 certified Spotters, 9 certified Military Spotters and 3 certified Navigators. We are searching for pilots and we hope to have a couple within the year.
We thank Calgary for the training support with three pilots, Gary, Dwight and Dennis , a navigator, Ed and a search coordinator, Orin . Thank you Dwight for laying out the targets for us. You did a great job.
Sept 15/12 Vulcan
Several of the CASARA Lethbridge crew met CASARA Calgary in Vulcan for the second Nav training exercise. We had a great day and got Brian, Larry and Marty up for Nav training and Lauretta, Elaine, Dave and Stephanie up on Spotter flights. It was a good day and excellent progress was made on training. Thanks again for Calgary and the three planes, pilots and support crews.
It's been a busy year and it's time for an update.
Training Aug 18, 2012
Lauretta, Stephaine and Marty had an opportunity to attend the Western Canada Sarex in Cranbrook, BC. We left on the Friday and had a great flight over the mountains from Lethbridge. Dwight had flown down on Thursday evening attending a company event and was our very capable pilot. We stayed at a very comfortable hotel and after a evening where we friends from CASARA Calgary and met many new CASARA crews from Manitoba, Sask and northern Alberta, breakfast at 7:00 am and off to the Cranbrook AP via a shuttle bus. The nine crews met at CASARA HQ and where soon busy plotting the search pattern for the day. It consisted of 10 targets and an ELT target separate from the main track. Our flight managed to find 6 of the 10. We also had a ground search exercise and found the target ELT. After the SAREX exercise we had a great supper and then back to the hotel. Sunday up early and off to the AP again.
After some maintenance on the plane we were off to Lethbridge. This had been the first flight over the mountains in a small plane for all of us from Lethbridge. It was a great experience as was the Sarex exercise. I think we all learned a lot.
Training Aug 18, 2012
Lauretta, Stephaine and Marty had an opportunity to attend the Western Canada Sarex in Cranbrook, BC. We left on the Friday and had a great flight over the mountains from Lethbridge. Dwight had flown down on Thursday evening attending a company event and was our very capable pilot. We stayed at a very comfortable hotel and after a evening where we friends from CASARA Calgary and met many new CASARA crews from Manitoba, Sask and northern Alberta, breakfast at 7:00 am and off to the Cranbrook AP via a shuttle bus. The nine crews met at CASARA HQ and where soon busy plotting the search pattern for the day. It consisted of 10 targets and an ELT target separate from the main track. Our flight managed to find 6 of the 10. We also had a ground search exercise and found the target ELT. After the SAREX exercise we had a great supper and then back to the hotel. Sunday up early and off to the AP again.
After some maintenance on the plane we were off to Lethbridge. This had been the first flight over the mountains in a small plane for all of us from Lethbridge. It was a great experience as was the Sarex exercise. I think we all learned a lot.
Training from Vulcan Airport
We had another great day for training on May 12 in Vulcan. The weather was excellent and spirits were high. Lethbridge CASARA and Calgary CASARA, all Zone 2, did their first joint training day and decided that meeting half way in Vulcan was a good plan to try. Lethbridge saw 6 members attend and Calgary saw 10 members attend including the three pilots. Training involved Navigation training and spotter training. Lloyd from our local group is now a fully certified spotter with his three spotter flights. He was able to get his classroom work completed May 10. Al, Sandy each had two Nav flights and a spotter flight each, Lauretta had one Nav flight and two spotter flights, Larry had two spotter flights and I had a single spotter flight. The good news is that Lethbridge now has 13 certified spotters.
Many of the Calgary crews had nav training and spotter training. A successful day all in all. I had a good opportunity to learn a lot more about search HQ and believe this will soon become the standard tool for creation of our search mapping and navigation.
Many thanks to the Town of Vulcan, and the Air Cadets training on their glider during our visit. We all had a front row seat watching the cadets learning the glider.
On a sad note, Warren had set up a target on a air strip near Mossleigh and left a note after ward thanking the landowner. He got a call soon after only to discover that the land owner was involved in a unfortunate mid air collision in Northern Sask. over the weekend. CASARA offers our most sincere condolences all the families of all involved.
Many of the Calgary crews had nav training and spotter training. A successful day all in all. I had a good opportunity to learn a lot more about search HQ and believe this will soon become the standard tool for creation of our search mapping and navigation.
Many thanks to the Town of Vulcan, and the Air Cadets training on their glider during our visit. We all had a front row seat watching the cadets learning the glider.
On a sad note, Warren had set up a target on a air strip near Mossleigh and left a note after ward thanking the landowner. He got a call soon after only to discover that the land owner was involved in a unfortunate mid air collision in Northern Sask. over the weekend. CASARA offers our most sincere condolences all the families of all involved.
A BIG ACHIEVEMENT
CASARA Lethbridge has hit another important milestone! We now have nine Military trained Spotters. What does this mean?
Well, simply put it means that if there is a search and rescue requiring the C130 Hercules and the onboard Sar Techs in Southern Alberta there is a good chance that members of Lethbridge CASARA would be called to Spotter duty and help with an active search. CASARA Calgary would already be active and any available Spotter from Lethbridge would already have recieved a call. It means that Lethbridge members would have split duty training and would be able to respond with conventional Spotter light aircraft or the heavy aircraft from the RCAF. I am so pleased to had be part of the CASARA training we have recieved. The picture below is the C130 and the crew including the nine members from Lethbridge.
Well, simply put it means that if there is a search and rescue requiring the C130 Hercules and the onboard Sar Techs in Southern Alberta there is a good chance that members of Lethbridge CASARA would be called to Spotter duty and help with an active search. CASARA Calgary would already be active and any available Spotter from Lethbridge would already have recieved a call. It means that Lethbridge members would have split duty training and would be able to respond with conventional Spotter light aircraft or the heavy aircraft from the RCAF. I am so pleased to had be part of the CASARA training we have recieved. The picture below is the C130 and the crew including the nine members from Lethbridge.
Training Update
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
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
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
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
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
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
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
Assisting CASARA Calgary with targeting
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.
mn
The Training Continues
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.
mn
More Trainees
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.
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