Posted: Aug 04, 2005 04:10 pm EST
In today's press release from Kathmandu (published on the official search site), Jodi and Barbara writes that a MI 17 helicopter carrying supplies and passengers - including Aussie ace climber Andrew Lock - flew to Lukla and on to a higher altitude to meet with Sherpas who will be instructed by Andrew on the search. After the meeting the helicopter will take the lead Sherpa higher up the mountain, so that the search can resume. Andrew will come back to Kathmandu this afternoon.

Thermal search

To aid in the SAR, organized by the 1st Special Response Group, Andrew will receive thermal technology. This after earlier considerations to deploy canines to assist with the search ran into issues.

Dogs adapt to altitude more slowly than humans; around three weeks is required to fully acclimatize. Area search dogs and avalanche dogs cover very large areas quite quickly. Yet if the search area has crevasses, you'd need to work the canine on a short lead, dramatically reducing their effectiveness.

Search dogs also affected by cold air

HRDSN stated earlier that search dogs don't function well above 5000 meters, but that's not the full problem - a spokesman for the 1st Special Response Group told ExWeb. It isn't necessarily the altitude; it's the entire environment, particularly the cold air that affects the search capacity of the trained dogs. If it was warm and moist at 17K feet and the dogs were acclimatized, they'd probably work effectively.

Sherpas have pointed to an avalanche at the time where Trevor was last seen - but Trevor also planned to do a short trip into the icefall - a heavily crevassed area. There is no time to acclimatize dogs, a thermal search is a tedious but faster option if he fell into a crevasse, or was hurt in an avalanche and/or buried in snow.

Race with time

Trevor could also have survived but lost his way enroute back to Gorak Shep (the trail strewn by boulders is difficult to find). There's plenty of water around, albeit no food. However, in 1991, James Scott became lost in the Himalaya in winter and survived for 41 days at an elevation of 3000 meters by eating only snow (find his story in the links section).

1SRG, a rapid deployment search and rescue and disaster response unit has organized local people including Asian Trekking to help, and local media is spreading the word in Khumbu valley over television broadcasts.

It wasn’t until the late 1930’s that the Swiss Army started training search dogs in Avalanche Rescue. Since that time trainers have refined their training techniques and now many avalanche victims can owe their lives to dogs trained in avalanche rescue.

The trained search dog works a snowfield rapidly, searching for “pools” of human scent rising up through the snow pack. When the dog finds a potential scent source he will bury his head into the snow trying to locate the source. If the human smell intensifies, he begins to dig trying to get closer to the source. If the scent becomes weaker, a trained dog will start to work outwards from the area to attempt to either pinpoint an area of stronger buried source or rule the scent out as surface odor left by human searchers.

The 1st Special Response Group is a unique organization specialized in International SARS "Anytime/Anywhere." Their website is a wealth of meaty info on how to save a life in extreme situations. In an introduction to Avalanche Rescue Dogs, Kim Gilmore provides a brief history of, reasons for and effectiveness of trained dogs in Emergency Rescue Services involving the public in a snow and avalanche context. Find this and other stories on the 1SRG website (links section).

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