Bill, I usually respect your observations, but this time you are way off base. EMS is legally not allowed to operate on a "one phone call to one caver" status. They have to consider worst-case scenarios. Having been involved with a lot of cave rescues over the years, my thought is that the August Airmans incident was actually pretty low-key. I think that DJ and crew kept it very real and used an entirely appropriate level of response. It is not the fault of EMS or cavers that there was so much media coverage. It's Austin, for goodness sake, in the middle of our beloved Barton Creek Greenbelt. Just try to keep ANYTHING a secret there! And as for the costs, maybe the EMS was getting paid to be there (maybe not, some of them might have been off-duty), but I know for sure that Bill Russell, Julie Jenkins, Mike Sisson, and all the other cavers that showed up were not getting paid for it. Time, mileage, equipment --- it's all known as "in-kind" contributions, and is a part of the true cost of the operation. I suspect that there were some other expendables added in to the total also, such as phone wire, food, batteries, and so on. Yes, these things do add up. Very quickly.
-- Jim Kennedy, former NCRC instructor --------------------------------------------------------------------- Visit our website: http://texascavers.com To unsubscribe, e-mail: [email protected] For additional commands, e-mail: [email protected]
