Aerie students as high school teachers

Fresh off their snowy backcountry trip, the Semester students looked like they could use a new challenge. Time to raise the bar.  Yesterday, the Aerie crew spent the day with three busloads of high school students. You heard right: our soon-to-be EMTs paired up to teach wilderness medical skills to over eighty 9th graders from Big Sky High School's Health Sciences Academy.  The day turned out to be an outstanding learning opportunity as well as a community service and outreach experience. 

Max and Katie taught bleeding control and wound management, so of course they needed some gore to spice things up.

David and Tyler P passed on some techniques they learned from Brad Bennett about moving patients under fire.  They added a special twist and turned the whole thing into a race.

David and Tyler offered each group the opportunity to haul the Big Sky teachers around in an improvised litter.

Nami and Max pose proudly with their pupils, who in turn proudly display their improvised splints.   The group learned how to immobilize lower arm and lower leg fractures.

Trenton and Clay offered Community CPR instruction as well as a tutorial in the use of AEDs. The students discovered their school has two AEDs; most had no idea what they were or where they were located and were surprised to learn how simple they are to use.

Dara (our Semester intern) helped teach stations as well. These students of hers perfected the art of a two-person carry.

Special thanks to Bob Vandenhoevel with Missoula Emergency Services who also taught stations during the day. Bob brought in his experience as a flight medic when he threw one eager group into a mock lightning strike, instructing them both in the Incident Command system and in signaling systems for helicopter rescues.

Back from Avalanche Training!!

Everyone is back from their five-day trip in the snowy mountains.  We had amazing conditions; it snowed over 2 feet during our stay at the yurtski area as the students completed three days of intense avalanche training.  Program coordinator Andrea Stephens joined instructors James Pyke and Josh Olsen for this training, which included instruction in snow science, avalanche forecasting, beacon use and emergency care of patients caught in an avalanche.  The overall focus was avoiding avalanches and preparing for a response in case they do occur.  We couldn't have asked for better weather, instructors or students.  To boot, we saw fresh grizzly bear tracks at the lower elevations, a sure sign that spring is almost here.

Traveling above the yurts to get into good terrain for avalanche training

Perfect conditions for avalanche training

A perfect bluebird day for our trip out

Caring for a victim of an avalanche

A tent covered in snow.

Winter Updates

Semester students have spent the last few days familiarizing themselves with the area, including snowshoeing on a dwindling spring snowpack, navigating with map and compass, and using the snow as building material.  Medically, they're focusing on cold injuries, hypothermia, and altitude sickness.

Everyone has been experimenting with a variety of fire starters, including this handful of pitch, lichen, and twigs.  They discovered the lichens don't burn well at this time of year because of the high humidity, and that the pitch will do well only once a pretty sturdy fire has already been started with other material.  

These guys are planning out their route indoors on the warm floor (in-floor heat!)  before heading out into the field.  

Stream crossings can be tricky at this time of year, so it's helpful to find big, fallen trees to use as travel corridors across the water.   

Snug inside a winter survival shelter constructed with snow and tree boughs.

Video

A quick synopsis of the students' activities so far.  See what you think!

http://youtu.be/g22TVnsc2FU

Montana

It's hard to believe that the last time we got together it was 90 degrees with 90 percent humidity.  Students today are wearing snowshoes, working their way around the Swan River as they practice making fires, building shelters and reading North American maps.  The mountains you see below are the Swan Mountains, forming the western boundary of the Bob Marshall Wilderness.  If you turned 180 degrees, you would be looking at the Mission Mountain Wilderness.  

In seven short days, everyone is packing up for a five-day ski trip into southern end of the Swan Mountains, where we will hold our avalanche training.

Back in Montana!!

After a very full month of training in Costa Rica, everyone is back in Montana and meeting this evening in the gorgeous Swan Valley.  We are so fortunate to have this group.  As promised, we are going to start getting some higher resolution photos on this blog as well as some videos.  Here are some of last photos we took at Rafiki, mostly of our day of river scenarios as the students floated the Savegre and encountered patients along the way.