A Monsey-based search-and-rescue squad has ramped up its own proficiency and training, to be there for the worst-case scenarios while hoping the next call never comes
Photos: Jeff Zorabedian, Giant Stairs Media
Tom apparently did all the wrong things when going on a hike on a recent Sunday morning. On a day when temperatures reached into the 90s, the lanky, lean 40-year-old didn’t take along a phone, had no sunscreen, no map, no water, and went off on the treacherous walk by himself.
Within a half hour of his hiking on the Palisades Cliffs, where steep inclines of hundreds of feet yawn below the narrow path and where huge boulders and tree stumps are sometimes the only footing, Tom collapsed.
Immediately, a group of frum men called Community Search and Rescue (CommSAR for short) set out from Monsey to rescue Tom. Complicating matters was the necessity of schlepping Tom along. That’s because Tom was merely a mannequin, a 40-pound dummy used in their training drill.
Our rendezvous on the Palisades Cliffs was part of a rain-or-shine monthly training exercise I would be taking part in with these search-and-rescue first responders for hikers lost in the wilderness. Out of CommSAR’s 35 on-call volunteers — mostly outdoorsmen for much of their lives — 17 participated in this drill.
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