The plans for the training program came after volunteer members of what is now the Humboldt Bay Fire Dive Rescue and Recovery Team-including Alvarez, Lecturer and Boating Safety Officer Steve Monk, Lecturer Hanna Johnston and Scuba Instructor Leah Stamper-conducted a search mission following the death of kayaker Nicholas Brunner in 2020. … Knowing a location where people can get the training is going to hopefully be helpful not only to Humboldt County, but surrounding counties and regions with a need to train search and recovery divers.”Ī diver-in-training practices body recovery at the Humboldt State pool by searching for a submerged mannequin while wearing a black-out mask to simulate zero visibility. “It's a very technical, very high-risk thing to go out and do.

“There's a need for first responders, whether they're members of fire departments, sheriff's deputies or volunteers working for dive search and recovery teams, to have some sort of formal training in public safety diving so they can do it safely,” says Rich Alvarez, HSU lecturer and diving safety officer. Humboldt State University and Humboldt Bay Fire are working together to launch a new To ensure the region has its own trained and certified search and rescue dive team,

Until recently, those missions were conducted by volunteer citizen divers at great personal risk. Since the 1990s, Humboldt County-a region with bodies of water ranging from the ocean and the bay to lakes and rivers-has gone without an official underwater search and rescue team.

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