During the warmer season, many Vancouver Islanders take to the straits for days of cruising, fishing and good times on the water.
But it’s not always fun and games. In the case of an emergency, the Station 37 Royal Canadian Marine Search and Rescue (RCMSAR) team in Sooke is keeping their skills sharp while having some fun of their own on the water.
From Victoria to Shuswap Lake, RCMSAR has more than 950 volunteers working year-round to keep boaters safe.
In Sooke, the team is heading into a busy summer with five recruits joining its ranks.
“It’s been a steady climb the last few years – building up a solid volunteer base and getting coxswain certified. It’s been really positive, for sure,” said Steven Whitworth, a coxswain at RCMSAR Station 37.
As the summer evenings grow long, Whitworth said it's a valuable opportunity to get new recruits on the water.
“We have more light, so it’s easier to get out and train some of the newer crews. In the winter, we’re stuck doing a lot of training at night. That means more advanced navigation – it’s more challenging.”
But even basic training follows strict procedures. It starts with a vehicle inspection, followed by suiting up in drysuits, life jackets and crash helmets. Then comes a detailed risk assessment, where crews evaluate mission hazards, fitness levels, weather and other factors.
Even on a clear day, the need for drysuits and visor helmets becomes obvious as RCMSAR 37B, the smaller of the two Zodiacs they pilot, skips across the water at speeds up to 40 knots.
Crews practice towing and rescuing dummies imitating overboard boaters.
“The vast majority of our calls are in the summer months,” said Erin Heeney, RCMSAR’s coordinator for training and development.
“Of those, most involve disabled or adrift vessels in need of a tow. We practice and train on towing regularly because it’s a high-risk activity we do frequently, so it’s incredibly important that we keep our skills sharp.”
Although it’s not just towing, and it's not just boaters that the Sooke detachment deals with. As hikers take to coastal parks in the areas through the summer, Station 37 will often respond to emergencies on land as well.
“Our station gets a decent number of calls to assist with missing persons or injured hikers along the Juan de Fuca Trail and East Sooke Park trails, especially,” said Heeney.
“In those instances, we’re working with ground search and rescue and often the RCMP to coordinate a search or patient extraction from a shoreline.”
It’s dangerous work – and a lot to ask of volunteers. But everyone who keeps on with the crew seems to love it.
Bruce Manning, 66, joined the station last year looking for something “a bit complicated.” With previous experience at the East Sooke Fire Department, he said the challenge was just what he needed.
“It made me feel better about myself, belonging to this group,” he said.
For Manning it's been sometime since he had to take on so much studying; he said it's almost like he is back in college.
“When I was first taking courses and studying, I was overwhelmed by all the new knowledge – my university degree is 50 years old now – but over the last three or four months I’ve been absorbing everything and keeping it.”
Manning says the camaraderie between the team has kept him coming back.
“It’s an organization with a lot of high-functioning individuals. There are some pretty amazing people here.”
From putting on his drysuit backwards to staying up late learning knots, it's safe to say Manning's first year has been a journey.
“I got to take the boat up to Sidney recently – that was exciting. It was heady stuff. I took the boat up to a certain top speed. I just felt like we were going to fly off into space,” he said.
On one of his more recent excursions, he helmed the boat at night, navigating up to a beach using only radar and engine thrust.
“My heart was just hammering,” he said.
“I said, ‘I can’t believe you guys are letting me do this,’ and [the coxswain] said, ‘I can’t believe I’m letting you do this.’ So then we reversed the radar and I backed the boat out. [...] It was a pretty big night for me.”
As the busy season approaches, RCMSAR and the Canadian Safe Boating Council (CSBC) are kicking off their annual Safe Boating Awareness Week, which runs from May 17 to 24.
As part of the campaign, RCMSAR and the CSBC will host a Safe Boating Awareness event at the Port Sidney Marina on Saturday, May 24, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. The event offers a chance to meet crew members, explore the rescue vehicles and learn how to stay safe while enjoying the waters of B.C.
