About the Seminar
This seminar provides extensive training in all phases of cave rescue, including vertical litter movement. The curriculum covers the cave environment, ropes and devices, leadership and followership, incident command, patient packaging, medical and psychological considerations, hypothermia, media relations, raising, lowering, and belaying. It prepares a student to be a task force member in an organized cave rescue. A typical day involves lectures in the morning, field exercises in the afternoon, and skills check-offs in the evening. The seminar will end with a student-run mock rescue. This seminar will introduce students to nationally adopted cave rescue practices and the caving environment. Successful graduates are eligible to take Level 2 training which is offered at the national seminar each year.
The seminar provides approximately 100 hours of instruction over seven days. The classes are physically strenuous and participants must be in good physical health. Students should be prepared to work in difficult situations, both above and below ground. NCRC requires participants in its seminars to possess certain skills as prerequisites. Each student must demonstrate his or her ability to independently ascend rope, change over, rappel part way down, tie off their descender, then down-climb safely to the ground as part of entry skills. Students must also demonstrate proficiency with the basic knots and hitches used in cave rescue. Information on specific prerequisites will be provided upon registration, and may be found on the NCRC website
