Prineville, Ore. — Members of the Crook County Sheriff’s Search and Rescue (SAR) team spent the weekend in the Ochoco National Forest conducting their annual overnight training exercise, an event that serves as both a critical readiness exercise and the final graduation requirement for the program’s newest academy members.
The training brought together experienced SAR volunteers, K-9 teams, and academy students for a series of realistic search scenarios designed to prepare participants for the challenges they may face during actual emergency deployments throughout Central Oregon.
According to the Crook County Sheriff’s Search and Rescue team, the weekend concluded the academy training process for the 2026 class of volunteers.
“Congratulations to our academy students and welcome to the team,” the organization said following a potluck dinner and award ceremony held Saturday evening.
The training included multiple lost-person scenarios conducted under realistic conditions in the forest.
At approximately 3 a.m. Sunday morning, SAR members responded to a simulated incident involving a camper who had failed to return to camp. Search teams conducted tight grid searches in and around the area where the subject was last seen. The subject was located within a couple of hours.
Later Sunday morning, beginning around 9 a.m., SAR volunteers participated in a second training exercise involving four missing individuals. The scenario utilized five K-9 teams along with additional SAR personnel. All four subjects were located within a few hours.
The exercises were designed to test search tactics, coordination, communications, and the capabilities of both ground searchers and search dogs in a realistic wilderness environment.
Annual overnight training exercises are a key component of maintaining operational readiness for volunteer search and rescue teams. Conducting searches during overnight hours and in remote forested terrain allows team members to practice the skills required for real-world incidents, where searches often begin with limited information and continue through the night.
The training also provides academy graduates with hands-on experience working alongside veteran SAR members before joining the team for future missions.
Crook County Sheriff’s Search and Rescue is made up of volunteers who assist law enforcement in locating lost, missing, or injured individuals throughout Crook County and surrounding areas. Team members routinely train throughout the year in wilderness navigation, search tactics, communications, emergency response, and K-9 operations.
The annual overnight exercise serves as one of the organization’s largest training events of the year and helps ensure volunteers are prepared to respond when residents and visitors need assistance in the region’s forests, backcountry, and remote areas.
Mr. Alderman is an investigative journalist specializing in government transparency, non-profit accountability, consumer protection, and is a subject matter expert on Oregon’s public records and meetings laws. As a former U.S. Army Military Police Officer, he brings a disciplined investigative approach to his reporting that has frequently exposed ethics violations, financial mismanagement, and transparency failures by public officials and agencies.
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