View from the Cabin We Need to Hear from You! AWR1(NAC/AW) Calder L. Epes, USN, AWR1(NAC/AW/SW) Broc Fournier, USN, AWR1(NAC/AW) Aaron T. Messner, USN, and AWS1(NAC/AW) Patrick M. Miller, USN
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ind us a SAR Petty Officer (PO) who doesn’t have a laundry list of complaints about training gear, pool scheduling, jumps scheduling, among many others, and we’ll show you a SAR PO who has his or her head in the sand. But isn’t that the nature of the job? We should always be unsatisfied and pushing ourselves to train better. Under normal circumstances, it all amounts to routine griping. But these have not been normal circumstances, yet we still met the mission, day in and day out.
Hickey credits the SARMM Team with developing training guidelines to aid shops in continuing training. With respect to evaluations, he adds that “in the beginning of the pandemic many Unit SAR Evaluations had to be postponed but once again the team adjusted and came up with creative ways to safely - but still effectively - evaluate SAR crews.” Several other unit SAR POs who we spoke with echoed similar experiences and talked about how while the pandemic restrictions may be adding some antagonizing weight to their programs, they are, overall, able to stay afloat. What they really wished for was attention and money going toward training gear and resources such as survivor gear for pool training. One SAR PO noted that he assembles a “composite” survivor out of a backpack harness, oxygen mask with bayonet fittings, and an RSSK held in place manually. Our SAR crews are adapting and flexing to the restrictions that the Navy has imposed but are often just making due and pretending they have training gear that many haven’t seen since ARSS in Pensacola.
Now, a year into the COVID-19 shutdown, we have to ask ourselves what the real impact has been on training and SAR effectiveness. Instead of relatively mild scheduling gripes, are our SAR POs facing more significant obstacles to getting adequate training conducted? How has the Navy’s shutdown of fitness facilities and the FRAGORD from last summer affected our physical fitness and SAR readiness? What about our deployed swimmers on ships and stations without fitness facilities? How have they fared? To better answer some of these questions, we asked a few community leaders and SAR POs what they see.
As far as physical fitness goes, there are two factors that appear to be at play. The first is the prevalence of home gyms among the SAR community. Long before the pandemic closed the gyms, SAR swimmers had a culture of turning their garages or sheds into rubber-lined weight rooms and crossfit-type gyms. The second factor is the use of off-base gyms that re-opened earlier in the pandemic. The limitations of the FRAGORD from last summer all but guaranteed that the only way for SAR crewmen that did not have their own home gym to stay fit was to violate COVID protocol. The issues presented by the pandemic begged the question, how do we respond when physical fitness is a requirement of the job? Fitness in this line of work is not just an easily waiverable requirement like “all Sailors must pass a PRT,” but a specific operational necessity. SAR swimmers must be able to carry out a rescue to save lives.
One of the leaders who has been closely tracking the impact of COVID-19 mitigation on SAR readiness is AWRCM Nathan Hickey at HSMWINGPAC. He quickly articulated the challenge "Since, SAR training by its nature involves significant close contact whether it is in the pool, ocean, or cabin. The easy short-term solution was to waive training requirements. However, it quickly became apparent that COVID-19 was not going to be a short-term problem.” As commands began flexing to the new training environment the old issues of inadequate training equipment and facilities became even more apparent. Naval Base Coronado, a Master Helicopter Base for both HSM and HSC, has the Crews Pool on NAS North Island units sometimes used the NAB Coronado MWR Pool during pre-Covid times. HSC units in Norfolk have few pool locations and they all are either falling apart or have standing reservations from ATG running the Surface SAR Program. So how did this set us up as a community to weather the Navy’s pandemic restrictions? AWR1 James Ritz from HSM-79 shared one positive theme that has arisen community dealing with the pandemic restrictions: cross-platform coordination. West Coast HSM and HSC Communities are communicating with each other to either share the pool or give a non-needed pool slot over completely. Meanwhile, in Ritz’ view, the issues that his shop has noticed are the perennial ones, not caused by COVID restrictions. There is not enough money for adequate training equipment and the crunch for SAR jumps boat support remains a challenge for units.
Our exploration of the state of our SAR training is far from complete, and we want to hear your experiences and opinions. Every voice we hear adds another piece to complete the picture and contributes to greater community self-evaluation. AWRCM Hickey summed up the NHA SAR Community’s response to the pandemi well and said "The COVID 19 pandemic was an unprecedented disruption to our force and especially to the way we train for SAR. However, our SAR crews never skipped a beat, they continued to execute rescues at sea, HADR missions and hundreds of COVID MEDEVAC and transport missions and did so safely.” SOML.
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