Who pays the cost of rescue?

Earlier this month, a National Park Ranger named Nick Hall was killed while rescuing climbers on Mt. Rainier.

From NBC News:

Hall was on Rainier’s northeast side at about 13,700 feet when he fell around 5 p.m. local time Thursday as he was helping the climbers aboard a helicopter, the service said.

“As the first of the climbers were being evacuated by helicopter, Mount Rainier climbing ranger Nick Hall fell, sliding more than 3,000 feet down the side of the mountain,” the service said in a statement.

…The climbers, two men and two women from Waco, Texas, had been walking on the Emmons Glacier Route on their way down from the summit when two of them slipped and fell into a crevasse, said Kevin Bacher, a park spokesman.

One of the climbers had a working cell phone and was able to notify park rangers. Rescue crews on foot located the climbers and lifted the two out of the crevasse, then began the process of transferring the climbers to a helicopter.

Every year we here in the Sisters Country hear of someone who gets themselves into a bind and needs rescuing. Such incidents often involve people who head out for a day, totally unprepared for something to go wrong that keeps them out over night or in a sudden onslaught of bad weather.

This kind of incident, especially something tragic like the Rainier episode always raises questions. A blog reader forwarded these:

·      Are we as a society are socially obligated to rescue adventurers who put themselves in harms way, or should they be ignored, since they know the risks, and let the chips fall where they may?

·      Should the rescued be held financially responsible for the costs of S & R, or, since they are (probably) tax paying citizens, should they be afforded S & R benefits? 

·      Should there be a superfund set up to pay for search and rescue, funded by said adventurers, to defray the costs of S & R, and give death benefits to the families of rescuers who are injured or killed in the process?

·      Should adventurers be require to purchase S & R insurance?

The SAR volunteers and professionals I’ve talked to often express frustration about people’s cavalier attitude to the wilderness in which they enjoy their adventures, their lack of respect for the elements, their lack of preparation for emergencies. But I don’t think a one of them supports making people pay for rescue. The reason? They’re afraid people will not call when they need to because they’re worried about the bill.

Anyway — interesting questions. What do you think?

Jim Cornelius, Editor

Voice concerns/priorities for Sisters School District

A group of Sisters Country citizens has requested a forum for soliciting community opinion on priorities for the Sisters School District as the district wrestles with cuts and approaches a critical vote on local option.

The Nugget made this space available for this dialogue. The citizens’ request is as follows:

If you have a child in the school district, you may have an idea of the issues that are facing current students.  If you don’t have a child in the district but have had or have an opinion on what are the pressing needs facing the local schools, YOUR INPUT IS VITAL as we will all be faced with voting on a local option for schools.

Please consider making suggestions in a sentence or two format.  By summarizing top 3-10 concerns as you see it, the information will be presented to the school board as soon as it can be organized …  as there are many pressing issues in a short time frame that may or may not be possible to address before school starts in the fall.

 Jim Cornelius, Editor

Sportsmanship and nobility

We’ve done enough commentary about athletes behaving badly that it seems appropriate to highlight something on the other side of the coin: http://espn.go.com/high-school/track-and-xc/story/_/id/8010251/high-school-runner-carries-fallen-opponent-finish-line.

Now that’s a noble act of sportsmanship right there. Hats off.

Jim Cornelius, Editor