| WHEN WATER -

IS THE ENEMY

“Terrace rescue teams are ready, —

’ While most people spent.a relatively.

_ warm but very. wet winter sitting in front: «
_ fireplace ; ‘dreaming. summer -
| dreams,’ ‘the 15-member Terrace Water.
bes | Resewa. Team learned how to rescue

people: unfortunate enough : to. fall we
‘through the ice, of a lake, river or. stream.

>. -A-few weeks ago the group. plunged —

into the Skeena River to practice rescue’.

OF. the

‘but they’d rather not g0 into action ' eo |

race “Fire Department. in ‘an’ exercise
- designed to: help both groups | fine-tune
-techniques..‘for:saving the. occasional
‘motorist who: somehow. winds up. ina
river or lake.

Why? People do these sorts of things

_ drive into rivers, fall through ice and
_ plunge. into: fast, moving .water: — and
‘someone, somewhere has to be ready at a

_.... techniques in a swift-moving river. ‘More e moment's notice to save them, 2: .
: erent, they teamed up with the TRE The Terrace: ‘Water Rescue: Team,
cone “though, has a problem.
- Anyone who. wanders: far
from the city core, is: to: a
~~ great extent on their own.
You: might think: its: a
. simple matter. Get into
. trouble, phone for: help,
‘and rescuers . magically
appear.
. But it doesn’t ‘work
that way. Walk:a -half-
- hour’s distance into.the.
“bush and it -will take a
. regcuer.a half hour to
reach you. A half hour,
that is, after he’s learned
of your need, And that
‘could. mean a consider-
able delay, as there are
no phones in the bush. -
For this reason, mem-
bers of the Terrace Water
Rescue Team like to pro-
-mote water safety. There
are always four members
of the team on call, and
they are able to respond |
within seconds of being
advised of any emergency.

Terrace firefighters and the Water Rescue Team. combined forces recently
in a simulated two-vehicle crash in which one vehicle caught fire and the
other veered off the roadway into the Kalum River. Terrace emergency staff
and volunteers will be attending a number of training programs this year.

10, Terrace Review — May 18, 1992