September 2020

Heidi McKeon, Snohomish County Volunteer Search and Rescue President “Three Teens Rescued from Three Fingers Mountain” the headlines read back on August 26-27, 2008. Our son was one of the three teens whose lives were saved. The 20 hours we spent at the SAR Base Camp was our family’s first introduction to these amazing volunteers of Search & Rescue. It was both the worst and best day of our lives. (You can find the whole story on the www.scvsar.org “Home” page, near the bottom in the “Our Stories” Section.) In the months following the Three Fingers rescue, my husband, my mother and I all joined SCVSAR as members of the Operations Support Unit (OSU). Much of my work on missions has been with Documentation in the Command Vehicle, as well as holding a leadership position within OSU for a number of years and eventually leadership positions with the County Board. As the first woman President of SCVSAR and the first President to come from the Operations Support Unit, my story simply highlights that anyone can meaningfully support this wonderful organization. While we need field qualified personnel to go on missions and be trained for units and teams, such as Everett […]

Leah Hainey, “Snohomish County Volunteer Search & Rescue” Facebook Page Administrator Having a good hiking plan is one of the most important things you should do prior to heading outdoors. At the very least, include what trail you are going to be on and what time you should be back in cell service by. Additional pieces of information we like to have when deployed on a mission are: names and cell phone numbers of all members in your hiking party, the type of car you drove to the trailhead, a list of gear you have packed and the type of boots you were wearing. If you’d really like to go above and beyond, keep a roll of aluminum foil in your vehicle and before departing on the trail, step on it to provide your boot print. Our man trackers can do AMAZING things and this would give them a great head start! Be sure the person you have shared your plan with understands that they will be responsible to call 911 if you miss your check in. This would likely deploy search and rescue to come to your aid. And remember…the second most important part of your plan is sticking […]

We have all seen the birthday donations on Facebook, but did you know that you can do one for SCVSAR? These fundraisers are an amazing way to promote and raise money and awareness for SCVSAR. Ways to access this feature for a birthday fundraiser differs whether you’re logged on a desktop or a smart phone. On Snohomish County Volunteer Search & Rescue’s Facebook page itself, it’s very easy to set up a fundraiser, and these are a wonderful means to generate interest and response when you make a contribution yourself and/or offer a matching donation. $1,480 was received by SCVSAR from Facebook Donations between 1/1/2020 and 8/26/2020. Thank you!

The K9 Team is a “Specialty Team” within the SCVSAR organizational structure and part of the Special Operations Group. The K9 Team mission is to conduct K9 search operations to locate lost, injured and/or deceased persons whenever and wherever required. There are currently 28 members of the SCVSAR K9 Team from the following SCVSAR Units: EMRU, Alderwood, Snohomish, Marysville, OSU, ESAR.  All members must be in good standing with their units and maintain their Core Competency Requirements at Field level as established by SCVSAR. Members of the K9 Team are either K9 Handlers or K9 Field Support and must complete additional training requirements, including the following: K9 Pet First Aid K9 Fitness Test (5 miles) Performing hider roles Radio reporting (start times, locations, status checks, etc.) Doing Subject Assessments K9 Search Plans Flagging Estimating and reporting location in UTMs The K9 Team trains constantly (when not in quarantine); we train to tough standards; we certify our K9 Teams using 3rd party evaluators. The SCVSAR K9 Team has 3 primary K9 disciplines: Trailing K9 Teams (1 Certified team, 1 team in training): Trailing K9s are trained to find a specific live human and need a scent sample of the subject. Trailing […]

AmazonSmile is a simple and automatic way for you to support Snohomish County Volunteer Search and Rescue every time you shop, at no cost to you. You’ll find the exact same low prices, vast selection and convenient shopping experience, with the added bonus that Amazon will donate a portion of the purchase price to your SCVSAR. On your first visit to AmazonSmile (smile.amazon.com), you need to select Snohomish County Volunteer Search and Rescue to receive donations from eligible purchases before you begin shopping. Amazon will remember your selection, and then every eligible purchase you make at smile.amazon.com will result in a donation. To shop at AmazonSmile simply go to smile.amazon.com  from the web browser on your computer or mobile device and select SCVSAR. You may also want to add smile.amazon.com as a  bookmark to make it even easier to return and start your shopping at AmazonSmile.  $705 was received by SCVSAR from AmazonSmile from 1/1/2020 to 8/26/2020. Thank You.