SAR Accident Case Study

[simon]

One only has to look at the trend in membership numbers and median age to see the future of CAP.

This is not to judge age. With it can come wisdom and experience. But to ensure the success of any organization, one needs to appeal to new members.

It is natural for a prospective member to ask "Why am I doing this?" or "What can CAP do for me?". Let's not conjure up old JFK quotes. I guarantee new members are not thinking that way. Cronyism is a big red flag and every CAP member knows somebody valuable to the organization who has quit because of it.

Any organization with a future should stop and ask itself why it still exists, whether it is still relevant today, regardless of how it got there. Prospective members ask that question. So do the people that fund it. And rightfully so. When the image that an organization projects publicly diverges from how it really functions, its purpose comes into question.

[rustyjeeper]

I'd say that CAP has a serious cultural and leadership problem.

CAP has a massive ingrained cultural problem. Simply look at the latest pictures of the winter NB to see it. Its plain and simple still a "good ol boy club" , and it just depends on which side of the isle you are on.

We have plenty of energetic and eager members that are waiting in the wings for a chance to take the flag and carry it on. Unfortunately more than not those people get ignored or are simply shown the door because they happen to hold ideas that could make CAP at all levels better, and it goes against the "good ol boy" club.

+1 :clap:

[bflynn]

CAP has a massive ingrained cultural problem. Simply look at the latest pictures of the winter NB to see it. Its plain and simple still a "good ol boy club" , and it just depends on which side of the isle you are on.

I'm a believer that cultural problems are leadership problems.  Leader's actions are key in building culture.

[simon]

The problem with the concept of needing "real" experince [sic] to be able to do the job.....is that we just don't have enough opportunities to gain that experience [sic].

Agreed. Here in CA, a typical pilot hardly ever gets to fly a SAR mission. If you asked 100 pilots, many of them would have never flown a mission.

Since the 121.5 satellites were turned off, the need for missions is rare. CAP planes are used mostly for training, including O-Rides, followed by CD.

I can't think of the last time I read of a search where CAP actually found the target before the sheriff or the military.

[manfredvonrichthofen]

We don't have to be the first one to find the target, just being there to narrow down where the target is is a massive help.

[Eclipse]

We don't have to be the first one to find the target, just being there to narrow down where the target is is a massive help.

+1 In a SAR, establishing where the objective isn't is a huge part of the search, which is why it's so important to
be certain when you sign off an area as "checked".

[simon]

I understand. But it is interesting to think about CAP's effectiveness by what it doesn't find when time after time, the other agencies seem to doing the finding.

Is CAP being directed to eliminate the less likely areas, leaving other agencies to go to the most likely areas? Are CAP pilots sent to the "safer" areas? I'd be interested to see the grids from the search for the Bonanza pilot that went down last week in the mountains here in CA in weather.

[simon]

BTW, just to back up my statement about where CAP planes spend their time, here is a breakdown of the 2011 hours, nationwide.

Training	46,254	45%
Other Missions	15,334	15%
Cadets	14,891	15%
CD	8,393	8%
Maintenance	7,945	8%
Transport	3,579	3%
O-Rides	2,915	3%
SAR	2,073	2%
Glider	1,093	1%
Total	102,477	100%

[simon]

Also, the percentage of total CAP hours spent on SAR in 2005-2007 was between 5% and 6%.

The percentages since then (No more 121.5 satellites) were:

  2008: 3.8%
  2009: 3.7%
  2010: 2.2%
  2011: 2.0%

[manfredvonrichthofen]

I know here when CAP is sent out, we do most of the finding. I don't know about other areas though. Now there aren't very many calls at all.

[Short Field]

Is CAP being directed to eliminate the less likely areas, leaving other agencies to go to the most likely areas?

My experience in multiple roles in multiple SARs leads me to believe the problem is that most of the CAP ICs, OSCs, and PSCs have no clue how to plan and execute a search.   On my one Save, I almost had to fight the rest of the crew to get them to fly a standard CAP search pattern instead of just going to spots and circling...and I was the PIC.  Mission base was only concerned with launching the aircraft.

A planned search with all clues being collected and processed yields results.  Otherwise we are just counting on blind luck.