Saturday, February 6, 2010 at 22:30 Justin Wheaton Despite several instructors being deployed to missions, and being snowed into their communities, BMC must go on. With a great class of students from several of our teams, as well as some from San Diego and Orange Counties, we conducted the class as planned. Thank you to all the students who braved the insanity that was the 330 and 18 highways that weekend.
Sunday, November 22, 2009 at 16:07 Sonny Lawrence The lecture portion of the Basic Mountaineering Course came to completion today with 26 students having attended. This year marks a significant addition to the course. Scott Cordner, Keith Church and Jeff Pierce, all from the National Ski Patrol delivered presentations on Avalanche Fundamentals and Rescue. Scott Cordner, Bear Valley SAR and Frank Hester, Wrightwood SAR have been advocating this change in BMC for a few years. The next step in this process involves adjusting the field experience for BMC. The time allotted to hands-on field work relating to avalanche has been expanded. A much more thorough discussion of avalanche awareness, snow pits and victim search and retrieval will be held. This should prove to be beneficial to our SAR members during training and missions in our mountains in the winter. All SAR members are encouraged to take the BMC next year in order to take advantage of the new curriculum. Please keep in mind that Personal Vertical Skills (PVS) is now required for BMC.
Friday, November 20, 2009 at 17:11 Dan Whitten BMC Classroom Session will be held at Sheriff’s Headquarters:
655 East Third Street, San Bernardino, CA 92415
Check-in begins at 0730 hours, Saturday November 21, 2009
Saturday November 21 – 0800 to 2000 with one hour lunch & dinner breaks
Sunday November 22 – 0800 to 1700 with a one hour lunch break
BMC Field Session will be held at Snow Valley Ski Resort, Running Springs, CA
January 23 & 24, 2010*
Directions: http://www.snow-valley.com/directions.html
Monday, November 16, 2009 at 18:51 Sonny Lawrence This year marks a significant change in our Basic Mountaineering Course (BMC). We are running it concurrently with two courses from the National Ski Patrol (NSP). These are the "Avalanche Fundamentals and Rescue" and "Mountain Travel and Rescue Fundamentals" courses. More information can be discovered at http://www.nsp.org/EduPrograms/education_programs.aspx . Upon successful completion, a BMC student will receive a NSP certificate for both courses. In order to accomplish this, the BMC program had to be expanded over our standard course offered in the past. The November lecture time on Saturday will be extended into the evening. The time spent on various activities in the field has been rearranged and extended in order to cover all of the avalanche material. All SAR members, old and new, are encouraged to attend the entire course. As with our standard BMC, only participants completing the entire program will receive the three certifications. All San Bernardino County SAR courses require registration for the event with Dan Whitten via a $50 deposit which will be returned if the participant attends.
Wednesday, August 12, 2009 at 12:20 Sonny Lawrence The Basic Mountaineering Course (BMC) is in the process of being updated. Over the past few months twenty SAR members from nine teams (one out of county) and two VF members have had online discussions about the prerequisites to take BMC, requirements to be an instructor and course design. Fourteen of those individuals met at the Sheriff Office and finalized changes. The updates will occur over the next two years.
For the next BMC, all students must be certified in Personal Vertical Skills (PVS). The due date for this is just prior to the field weekend, January 23-24, 2010. Thus individuals can take the lecture portion on November 21-22, 2009 while learning PVS.
For more information please email Sonny Lawrence, Cave and Technical Rescue Team: canyonear AT gmail DOT com.