The Idaho Army National Guard state aviation group conducted hoist training with the Boise Fire Department April 2-6 at Gowen Field in Boise to facilitate future readiness for domestic operations.
The two agencies previously worked together in February 2017 to rescue a 68-year-old man in the community of Weiser after floodwaters left the man stranded in his house. This training program was the result of an after-action review of the rescue.
During the rescue, an Idaho Army National Guard Soldier was lowered by hoist into the river after it was discovered firefighters did not have the proper hoist training. Leaders from the Idaho Army National Guard and the Boise Fire Department agreed afterward that joint training should occur so that in the future, officials will have the option to lower a firefighter with swift water rescue training and equipment into the water in a similar situation.
“The collaborative training we do with the Idaho National Guard is priceless,” said Paul Roberts, Boise Fire Department division chief of special operations. “This joint training that the Guard provides Boise Fire with is highly specialized, and it provides the unique opportunity to learn techniques that could save a life. This training solidifies what we need to know to be successful in helicopter rescue scenarios.”
The training was designed to allow members of Boise Fire Department’s dive/swift water rescue team to become familiar with an aircraft’s hoist while wearing their river rescue gear. In addition, the training provided the opportunity for Soldiers and firefighters to work together outside of an emergency situation. The training was conducted over multiple days so that members from each of the fire department’s three shifts could complete the program.
Firefighters received classroom training and then practiced hooking into the hoist while still on the ground inside an aircraft hangar before completing familiarization training in an H-60 Black Hawk. Firefighters trained on both the Black Hawk and the UH-72A Lakota.
“It’s easier to train a firefighter who has swift water training to ride on the hoist than it is to train an Army hoist operator to become swift water-qualified,” said senior firefighter Mike Barbero, who is also an Idaho Army National Guard helicopter pilot.
Barbero coordinated the training between the Idaho Army National Guard and the fire department.
In addition to completing the Weiser River rescue, the 1st Battalion, 183rd Aviation Regiment also rescued a 55-year-old man stranded in the Frank Church Wilderness area in October 2017.
BY CPT Robert Taylor, Idaho NATIONAL GUARD
