Cone SAREX - 2

An email arrives out of the blue from Wairarapa Search and Rescue (SAR) noting that I'd been a missing party for an exercise a couple of years ago (more than three as it turns out) and would I be available to do so again.

It's good to be able to help out in some small way and you always learn a thing or two on these sort of outings, so I'm more than happy to oblige. 

A few days out, Tony (Police) touches base to confirm the briefing for the missing persons party is at the Masterton SAR base at Midday Friday and we'll be heading up to Cone to camp for the night before deploying to our locations. We duly convene and receive our instructions ...

What:   SARex
Who:     Paul, Fiona, Cameron, me
Where:  Cone area - eastern Tararuas
When:   15-17 November 2019
Photo credits:   Fiona, apart from the bad ones of the inside of my fly and the clematis   
Maps:






Saturday details - camp at triangle, broken leg at arrow, F&C purple, cancelled route blue

Tony has outdone himself with the creativity of the backstory. Paul, Fiona, Cameron and I are a group of Christian aid workers just returned from Vanuatu and headed into the hills for a bit of adventure.  Paul's wife is not too thrilled about the prospect given his fitness but has dropped us at the Waiohine road end - she has some vaguely outlined intentions that will be fed to the Incident Management Team at the appropriate time.

We're supplied with written story lines, injury descriptions, RTs (with a scramble channel as well as the same channels as the rescue teams so we can follow progress), grid reference to be missing at, GPS unit and ration packs for the weekend before a member of the constabulary (in the role of Paul's wife) takes us to the road end.

In real life, Paul is an experienced tramper who has been the missing person on quite a few SAR exercises including the one I went on. Fiona and Cameron are Wellington SAR volunteers who are looking forward to the experience from the other side of the fence.

Just before we head off we take a group photo which will be supplied to the IMT.





We take it slow on the way up and over the familiar route to Cone Saddle. Although there's been a bit of rain, the mud is still el dente. We check in with Tony from the saddle and start up to Cone itself.  As we climb it gets colder and windier. The forecast bad weather is starting to come through so we keep an eye out for possible 'plan B' camping spots should the high camp be untenable - there's not much in the offing though.














At the bushline we disperse through the low goblin forest to try to find our own wee niches. The wind is whipping across the open top of Cone and driving the first of the drizzle through the sparse cover of the forest edge. It's looking like a very uncomfortable night is in the offing.

The others find their positions and I plumb for the spot I used last time - it's a bit damp underfoot but flat and has some usefully spaced trees. The fly whips in the wind and the para cord ties itself in notes to frustrate increasingly numb fingers.

Eventually I have a low pitched fly with a jury rigged wind break down the sides from a stack of branches left by the last track clearing party. It looks wholly inadequate but I will be sleeping in my bivvy bag as well so I consider it done and pop over to Fiona and Camerons' rather more salubrious digs. They have a three sided fly with some actual head room and water boiling for dinner, I cadge a cup full and we sit in the gathering gloom watching Paul's fly whip in the wind. I can feel the roots of the tree I'm sitting against lifting as the tree flexes.

Chez Paul - the lump in the middle is him

Room for two

How low can you go?

It's a restless night. The wind batters my position with rumbling signalling when a particularly strong gust is barreling in across the tops. The fly is below the worst of it but is taking a beating and there's enough rain that water starts flowing underneath. I'm warm but definitely hunkered down to endure the night and don't get a lot of sleep with the nylon flapping a few inches above my nose.

Snug?

Tony calls up on schedule in the morning to say that there will be no helicopter flying today - this means ground teams will have to walk to our location to start the search, adding about four hours. He outlines a slightly changed scenario whereby Paul will be found more quickly but the rest of us will stick to the original plan. I radio Cameron and Fiona (about 12m away) to liaise on a get up and out time - they're keen to get moving as our target locations are in the lee of the ridge. I've already had breakfast so this gives me a bit of time to contemplate my next move.

The big down side of bivs in bad weather is the logistic complexity of getting into and out of them with out getting your dry gear wet and muddy. I spend the last few warm minutes in my sleeping bag stepping through the process.

Although the wind is still strong with belts of rain coming through, it's not too cold so once we get moving it's not bad. We leave Paul under his fly - he'll wander down the track a wee way when the search team approaches and pretend to be suffering the effects of a diabetic attack. His story will confirm our direction of travel and our intention to leave the marked track.

A brief stop to pick up water from the tarn which has an active spring in it today and shortly after we are back in beech forest and out of the wind.

There's no hurry so we amble along until where my spur diverges and I say goodbye to Fiona and Cameron. They are destined for the next major spur where they will be overcome by a violent bout of Campylobacter rendering them non-responsive - me; to break my tibia off the side of my spur.

Christian aid worker Fiona prepares for the ordeal ahead

The somewhat devout Cameron and me

With plenty of time I wander down making no effort to hide my trail. It's a bit of a tricky shape to the spur in places - left to my own devices I would have just pottered along with compass and map, but I crack out the GPS in a few spots as I don't want to stuff the exercise up by ending up in the wrong spot.

Part way down an explosion of white flowers draped through a sub-canopy tree herald a clematis vine. They glow in the low light but are tricky to get a shot of due to the wind. I assume it is Clematis peniculata or puawhananga which flowers around now.

Around the 600m contour there's a wee knob, it's about where I'm supposed to have wandered off the main line of the spur and followed a side spur north east, but for now I decide to stay put knowing I have radio coverage until a search team gets close.

It's windy but the cloud cover is trying to break - I wrap up and settle down on my sleeping mat for lunch with sleeping bag and fly spread out to dry. Every hour Tony checks in and I follow the progress of the search parties. Fiona and Cameron report that they have found a lovely flat spot on their spur and set up camp.

Fiona and Cameron - very comfortable

A party eventually radios in that Paul has been found - he dutifully delivers his messages then tags along as they are redeployed along the ridge. Time for me to head for the site of my accident. I discover that my sleeping mat has a puncture - an added incentive to be found in time to get to a hut or road end.

In the end I prop a little way up slope of my final objective and sit and read my book with half an ear on the radio. At his next call in Tony agrees that the chances of finding me here tonight aren't good so I redeploy back to my previous spot around 600m - no reading though as there are spots of rain. I don't have to wait long before another change in plan - it seems one rather than two parties will be searching my spur so I need to relocate further up, and quickly as 'there are a couple of grey hounds in that group.'

I race back up, find a plausible spot to have taken a fall (on the leeside of the spur) - and settle in again. This time in clag with the bad weather feeling ominously close.  I'm worried that the team may have beaten me and headed down to 386 according to the revised search plan (blue dots on map) but Tony calls in and confirms they are still on their way.

Soon after I hear voices from up the spur - I blow my whistle and shouting ensues. I am most decidedly a responsive patient with every intention of not having to spend another night out.

The team turn up and do their thing - assessing my condition, asking what I know about the others, reporting to base etc. They are quite proud to report the signs they have found of my trail - foot prints and scuff marks (yep - should be lots of those), a wee coloured rubber band (never seen it before), and a mock camp site (sorry - not me either). They also ask if I heard their whistling (nope - just the voices).

After a while I am miraculously healed and we proceed on down the spur - apparently the team has been retasked and we will be following the spur to Totara Flats and not the side spur to 386 (so I didn't need to race back up the hill after all).  Periodically they pause and spread out, block their ears, blow their whistles then listen intently. One of them is sure he hears a whistle but as the party closing in on Fiona and Cameron are well over a kilometre away with a strong wind it wasn't from the search exercise..

The team are still looking for signs of the other missing persons so in the interests of speed I break role and point out that I've been down and up the spur so don't get too excited by all the marks. 

The search develops a twist with the notification of a real missing person on Mt Reeve - south of the search area. A teams is duly dispatched to Tutuwai  Hut with instructions to set out early and search in the morning - another couple of teams are located to the Waiohine road end for possible deployment in the morning (however the chap walks out under his own steam in the end). The rest of the exercise continues.

At 600m the spur shape gets confused so the team follow their GPS but towards the bottom we drift off and the last 40 vertical meters is through supplejack and kiekie in the gathering dark.

At the bottom we are abruptly on flat ground and within 40 meters I'm standing on the track. It's starting to rain in earnest.

The team confer on next steps - bivvy up here or head to the hut. I'm mildly interested in their conclusion as I have absolutely no intention of spending a night out in the rain and wind with a flat sleeping mat.

Fortunately they come up with the correct answer and we head out on what will be (after one wee terrace) a flat three kilometres to Totara Flats Hut.

My headtorch batteries are just about had it but I'm not going to hold the party up to change them so stick to the leader's heels, the rest of the team strung out behind. Doing a quick count we realise that there are too many lights - it looks like another team is behind us. It turns out to be Fiona and Cameron who were left behind by their rescuers to strike camp - they seem to have recovered as well from their D&V as I have from a broken leg.

Eventually a tinge of woodsmoke in the air followed by the smell of the loo herald our arrival at a crowded Totara Flats Hut.

There's quite a few of the SAR teams in loc as well as the usual punters. A Meet-up tramping group is also settled in and I exchange a few words with Scott but am a little bit more intent on getting out of the wet and into some dinner.

There's no mattresses to be had so I settle on my deflated mat on the common room floor. Outside the wind slashes rain against the hut.  The morning can wait but we are required to be at Holdsworth road end by 10am so it will be an early start.

I sleep surprisingly well - aided by the near miraculous lack of snorers (the bunk rooms didn't fare so well apparently).

The SAR parties start heading out so the missing persons link up again and set off into the elements. The Waiohine is up and turbid - there would be no crossing it today. The track up Totara Creek is mostly a running stream until the footbridge and the start of the sidle up the hill.

One of our party is not 100% so we take it slowly and let the other parties past. It's unrelentingly soggy at the start.

The track is well marked and of a good standard. After the first steep climb it ambles along and down to the saddle between Totara and Carrington creeks. This is where it hooks up with the old route that followed Totara creek. The next section is interesting because, although it is on a bit of a spur there is often a wee stream running down the track. It is also the longest climb in the Tararuas - not because it actually is, just because you want to have it over and done with but it just doesn't seem to want to end.

Our afflicted party member is making heavy weather of the climb so we redistribute some gear and I end up with a pack on front - fortunately two ridiculously light packs make up a normal pack so it is no hardship.

The end of the climb is signalled when the track flattens and sidles east across the slope - we pop out at the junction with Gentle Annie track for the long downhill. Gear is redistributed to its rightful owner and we head on down at a good pace.

Paul points out some useful side spurs to the Atiwhakatu river and links up ridge to the old track - he clearly knows these parts very well. The weather gets progressively better as we head for the valley floor and we start bumping into day and dog walkers.

At the last bridge I hear over the radio that the van is full and is leaving - bugger, we'll have to wait for another to be dispatched.  It's not so bad though as there are patches of sun breaking through and the time passes quickly.

The SAR base is a hive of activity with the IMT winding down, teams debriefing and gear being checked in. I make a beeline for 1. the car (dry clothes) then 2. the BBQ.

Pretty soon I'm warm, dry, fed and have returned the electronics. The volunteers are exchanging notes about their various taskings; they are friendly but it's a little like any club when you're not a member so I slip away and leave them to it.

Wairarapa SAREX 2019 - Missing persons team

Postscript

I said you always learn a thing or two during these events - so,what were they?

There's how SAR teams and events operate - I'm bound to need them one day and it's good to understand what to expect. On the pragmatic side, I used a GPS in anger for about the second time in the bush and I learned the hard way how robust my sleeping pad isn't. I also have a better idea about the limitations of my fly.

The main thing that struck me though was the psychological difference between SAR team members, tramping parties and me. SAR operations are large, command and control affairs; for it all to work teams have to trust that IMT will make the decisions and do the tasking - too much autonomy would be a bad thing. The team members themselves have to be able to stick to their subtasks and work together to be effective. Decision making is by necessity through group processes within externally defined parameters and religious attention to safety. Team member skill levels are definable in terms of formal training undertaken, experience and assignment to leadership roles. It's a little like working with the army but, as volunteers, the uniform/civvy divide is less pronounced.

Tramping groups share a lot of these characteristics but without the same external command and control element and with varying degrees of formality around group decision making. Competence is often harder to gauge, highly variable and leadership self-assigned. They can be great or downright dangerous.

As a solo tramper I find group process and progress to be slow - not having the advantage of group discussion I'm used to analysing a problem while I'm walking, and only really stopping to assess a hazard or make navigation decisions. Although free of the problems of group think and risk threshold shift I have to try to avoid pitfalls like personal blind spots and failing to recognise impaired decision ability. I reckon you think differently when there's no one there to watch your back and need to be mindful about how this influences how you behave when in a group.

Although my views on the net increase in risk associated with solo tramping are on record, I did observe how being in a group changed my risk exposure.  On my own I would have stayed in Cone Hut on Friday night and headed up the ridge early Sat morning - thereby avoiding a rough night out. I would also have been off the spur and to the hut in daylight hours and less exposed to the elements by being out faster on the Sunday.

So what? I'll probably carry a bit more kit when I'm in a group as there is more standing around getting cold and higher chance of getting into some situations I would avoid on my own.

But overall, the main thing was getting a better appreciation of the hours and effort that a lot of volunteers put into SAR - I sure am a helluva lot happier knowing they're out there practicing for when I might be needing them.