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Letters to the editor for the week of February 28th

WSAR and the Clinic heli-pad I have been asked by friends and members of the Whistler community, why Whistler Search and Rescue (WSAR) is so concerned about the Whistler (Health Care Centre) helipad? The following is a quick overview: WSAR's mandate
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WSAR and the Clinic heli-pad

I have been asked by friends and members of the Whistler community, why Whistler Search and Rescue (WSAR) is so concerned about the Whistler (Health Care Centre) helipad?

The following is a quick overview: WSAR's mandate is to respond to backcountry emergencies in remote locations.

Historically, WSAR calls are often the product of difficult communications, isolated location and significant time delay. Impacts of altitude and weather can lead to a deteriorating condition of the subject, resulting in a need of expedited higher care in a medical facility.

Unlike other emergency responders in the valley (ski patrol, fire, and ambulance), helicopters generally become the main mode of evacuation and transport.

The current restriction at the Whistler (health centre) helipad to twin engine helicopters (H2 status) affects us in a number of ways;

WSAR depends on availability of charter aircraft at the time of the call. Twin-engine machines are not always available, given that the majority of helicopters in the valley are single-engine aircraft.

The decision to use a Twinstar (if available) would normally be based on the need for WSAR to transfer patients directly to the (health care centre) heliport in critical medical situations. Unfortunately, the more modern single-engine (Astar) is lighter, more powerful and therefore better suited for high mountain rescue.

If the (health care centre) pad were certified for H3 (single-engine) helicopters, this would allow WSAR to use the best, and safest aircraft for the job on local missions, which can take place as high as 9700' ASL. These rescues place a high demand on the aircraft, as well as the pilot. Available power becomes much more of a safety consideration than the redundancy of a second engine. In short, the single engine restrictions are placing an increased risk on the volunteer SAR members, pilots, as well as the subjects.

In closing, WSAR team members literally stop their lives when requested and attend to the matter at hand. Often these requests for assistance occur in poor weather conditions, fading light and combined with environmental conditions, can present significant risks.

WSAR team members, justifiably, are questioning the validity of why they should be elevating their personal risk in performing these timely evacuations, and then be forced to overfly the clinic to the Whistler municipal heliport, so that their patient can be "handed off" to EHS.

The extra flight time, the transfer from aircraft into ambulance, then the drive back to the clinic by ambulances can sometimes cause critical delays of over one half hour.

The current situation should be a concern to the whole community!

Greg Newton, WSAR treasurer

John Hetherington WSAR director-a-large

Intolerable Situation

Last week's Pique carried a detailed article on Whistler SAR's rescue responses from the previous year and the concern brought forward at the Team's AGM regarding the delay by Vancouver Coastal Health Authority to re-establish single-engine helicopter access to Whistler Health Care Centre.

With the tragic death of the 19-year-old Danish skier on Phalanx Mtn, the day following the AGM (Feb. 20), this has now become an intolerable situation for Whistler Search and Rescue.

Many of (the calls) WSAR team members are requested to attend (are) tragic by nature, and many may very well not have happy endings. WSAR team members understand and accept this.

What the team members cannot accept is the continued denial of the urgent need for immediate medical care in a community that is built on active outdoor lifestyles. Whistler did not become the world-class four-season resort that it is based on delivering second-class service. We cannot continue to beckon people to our natural resources and amenities and then, when misfortune arises, treat them to a knowingly deficient health care delivery system.

In a tourist-based economy this is a very obviously poor business model.

Back in July of last year, as a result of two previous incidents that WSAR members had attended to in the preceding three-month period, both of which shared some of the same characteristics and a common outcome as did the Feb. 20 Phalanx Mountain response, the volunteer SAR team made the pro-active decision to engage VCH in a co-operative manner and offered to assist the health care authority by way of community support and possible avenues for fundraising.

Based on this engagement process, WSAR was of the understanding that a resolution to this critical problem was well underway. In fact, WSAR was of the belief that most of the investigative work in terms of scope and costs of the required work had been completed.

However, when prompted by WSAR on Jan. 31, that the issue was still unresolved and that the team's effectiveness as a partner in emergency health care continued to be eroded by delays, VCH responded with this:

"...the entire scope of work is very expensive and would entirely take place on municipal land. In fact, just to create a scope of work for the project, just to investigate impacts and potential costs is an expensive endeavor. As such, a comprehensive list of the benefits such a project would yield is a necessary part of the business case behind it. We don't have a comprehensive list. We have very little in the way of hard evidence that supports a complex project like this one."

How many more incidents will be required in order for VCH to determine the need to re-establish this critical facility? Will it be you, or your daughter, perhaps a friend or an associate in need of care. Unless somebody intervenes soon, it's going to be someone. Quit the foot dragging and fix the problem.

Brad Sills

WSAR Society

Action on plastic bags

I have travelled — and grocery shopped — around the world. Many of the places I have got provisions from are tourist destinations and in most of these places free plastic bags are no longer an option.

What is the alternative? I usually have the choice of a free paper bag or an inexpensive bag I can pay for and re-use. Often there is the third choice of a more substantial bag, which will last for years. I have always felt welcome — and never offended — when free plastic bags were not available. In fact, having to chose, and pay a nominal fee for a green alternative, has always enhanced my "tourist experience."

If any one of us — resident or visitor — has to run into a grocery store at the last minute (without our own bag in hand) we can easily pay an extra small fee to purchase a re-usable cloth bag available at the checkout.

I urge Whistler Council to be more proactive about this.

Irene Whitney

Alpine Meadows

Bring your own bags

Your mayor is aghast about plastic bag use and wants to reduce their use? She doesn't need an investigation, she needs an action plan. Get the supermarkets onboard, get them to sell reusable bags, get other businesses involved — after all reusable bags make great walking advertisements. Reward tourists, who bring their bags to stores, don't automatically bag small number of items. If necessary consider charging for plastic bags and offer plastic bag recycling.

Works in Melbourne, (so it) can work here.

We brought bags with us last year and this year. It's a shame we aren't the norm.

Tony Pincus

Melbourne, Australia

Signatures please

In the next few weeks a petition about public nuisance and annoyance (from the asphalt plant and Whistler Aggregates) will require your signature if you are an owner or occupier, including renters in the vicinity, of the plant's operations.

If you are about the enjoyment of life in your neighbourhood we ask you sign the petition, as we are in this together as a community.

...So let's make the change happen now by supporting this petition. Some residents may think it is not an issue now, but some residents want to address it before spring start-up. Thank you in advance for your support.

Doug Ryan

Whistler

Where can breeding birds go?

I was concerned to read Nigel Matthews' letter "Time to Compromise," in Pique Feb.21.

I lived in Pemberton for a short while and loved it there — it is such a beautiful place. I also love dogs, man's best friend no doubt. A well-trained dog with a good owner is rarely a problem, on or off leash.

However, how can Nigel be sure that the only reason the Canada goose is the last breeding waterfowl on One Mile Lake is not a result of disturbance by people or dogs?

In the olden days, Common Loons nested there, but they are always the first to abandon a lake when it gets disturbed. Fifteen years ago I could have found breeding Pied-billed Grebe there as well. Barrow's Goldeneye used to nest in tree cavities adjacent to the lake and when the young are ready, they jump out of the nest and walk to One Mile Lake, not fly. I know this because I watched them. It is a very hazardous journey.

Also, is the Common Yellowthroat really the only breeding warbler there now? How sad. I could have found breeding Yellow, MacGillivray's, and Orange-Crowned Warblers not long ago, and quite a few other breeding neotropical migrants including the rare Gray Catbird.

I guess there is always somewhere else for the birds to go, or is there?

B. Max Gotz

Vancouver

Twenty-One Mile Creek snowmobiling

Thanks to a more liberal access policy at Whistler Olympic Park this year, backcountry skiing near Rainbow Lake in Twenty-One Mile Creek is more popular than ever, and with good reason. There's easy access to good ski terrain in what is supposed to be a non-motorized wilderness area. Yet snowmobilers are continuing to ride illegally in the watershed on an almost daily basis. These 600-pound machines are noisy, smelly, and spew a large portion of their fuel unburnt into the snow.

Under the Sea to Sky LRMP, Sproatt Mountain and Twenty-One Mile Creek were originally planned to be a fully non-motorized area. The snowmobilers objected, so a compromise was put in place in 2009 — snowmobilers would continue to have use of the south and west slopes of Sproatt, and the Twenty-One Mile Creek watershed would be a non-motorized zone. At the time it was recognized that the long, remote boundary would be difficult to enforce, so voluntary compliance would be necessary.

Four years later there is still no voluntary compliance despite extensive signage. Snowmobilers regularly ride right past large "no snowmobiling" signs and into the watershed. Snowmobilers have had their chance to make voluntary compliance work, so now it's time for a different solution.

The whole Sproatt Mountain area should be closed to snowmobilers entirely. This will make enforcement possible, as there is only one access point that snowmobilers can use. If snowmobilers can't use the Sproatt Mountain area without respecting the non-motorized areas they shouldn't be allowed to use Sproatt Mountain at all.

Scott Nelson

Vancouver