Lt. Matt Looper of the Lafayette Police Department and Tennessee Constable Tom Dallas of Macon County, recently completed the first of three Search Operations schools conducted by the Tennessee Emergency Management Agency (TEMA) in the Smokey Mountains of East Tennessee. Lt. Looper and Constable Dallas joined approximately 25 other professionals such as emergency management directors, sheriffs deputies, police officers, park service personnel and rangers, search and rescue squad and fire department personnel in the Basic Visual Tracking School which is designed to teach and develop the skills necessary for Law Enforcement and other emergency personnel to track and find humans in the wild, whether they be escaped prisoners, fleeing felons, lost and wandering medical patients or lost/wayward children.

TEMA has developed and offers a series of Search Operations courses to build "teamwork based" expertise in groups of persons who are trained to conduct search operations using visual tracking and land navigation skills in support of local County Emergency Management and Law Enforcement Activities. These skills start with the Basic Tracking course which is 24 hours and progresses through Advanced tracking (a 40 hour course) and finishes with another 40 hour course which is Management of Search Operations. These courses are offered to individuals who are capable and willing to provide these services to their local city and county governments and agencies to assist in or conduct emergency search operations. Targeted groups for the Basic Course are paid/non-paid emergency personnel such as search/rescue squads, park rangers, police/sheriff tactical teams and other emergency personnel.

Funding for these programs comes at NO COST to the citizens of the County because TEMA gets federal grant monies and other revenue which is earmarked for development and maintenance of emergency management activities and homeland security. Lt. Looper and Constable Dallas made their personal time available and paid their own transportation and associated costs in order attend the training and make the services available to the County. TEMA covered the course, lodging and meal costs.

The course started with 4 hours of classroom work covering map and compass reading, developing courses of travel using compass bearings, search/rescue equipment and gear, interpretation of tracks and signs and the psychology of fleeing, wandering and lost persons. The balance of the 20 hours of training was in real outdoor, wilderness settings in the Cades Cove/Elkmont area of the Smokey Mountains National Park. Track was laid by professional trackers from the State Department of Corrections Tactical teams and other local instructors from the State and National Parks Services and Law Enforcement community. The primary instruction for the course was provided by Mr. Richard D. Taylor, Area Coordinator for the Tennessee Emergency Management Agency.

Courses were laid out over one to five mile areas. The participants had to establish a course of travel using topography maps and compass bearings and then follow tracks and signs such as footprints, mashed vegetation, broken twigs and limbs, displaced rocks and logs through the forest, across creeks and streams, over and around mountainous areas. While navigating the course through steep mountainous terrain and thick vegetation, they carried approximate 20 plus pounds of gear such as compass, food, first aid kit, radio, rope, rain gear, water, tracking stick and other emergency necessities.

And, as if the terrain alone was not difficult enough, while following the tracks...they had to locate and retrieve hidden objects such as toothpicks, food wrappers, golf tee's, cartridges, and other objects as might be dropped by fleeing, wandering or lost persons.

Group grid searches were also conducted where trackers worked side by side to spread over a wide area to look for persons and lost objects. This methodical grid search technique is used often to search for lost or missing individuals who may be sick or injured and lying immobile in one spot.

The final section of work was a test of the participant's ability to apply the knowledge and skills acquired. In four to six person teams the participants followed a track laid down by the instructors which involved the combined use of all of the skills to follow and locate the person being tracked, locate any lost or discarded objects and to finish within an allotted time frame. And to top it off, all of this had to be done in a downpour of cold rain.

Lt. Looper and Constable Dallas received their certification for this course on Wednesday, April 9th and are planning to attend to Advanced course this coming October.

Their services are available to state and local agencies and departments which may have a need to discuss or conduct search operations. Contact and coordination is via the Director of Macon County Emergency Management, Mr. Keith Scruggs.