Lost Person Behavior: A search and rescue guide on where to look - for land, air and water

Very informative.

I am not involved in Search and Rescue (SAR), and have no training whatsoever in the field. However, I found the book quite interesting and was unable to find reviews from the layman's perspective prior to my purchase. So, I am providing that here and hope that it's useful to others. (Note: In my review, I am greatly over-simplifying a varied and complex subject for the sake of the non-SAR reader.)This book is, first and foremost, a resource for SAR. The author is careful and methodical, and organized Chp 1-4 of the book with the history of SAR data collection and how an International database for SAR was established.In the development and collection of data, categories have been developed to classify lost child, lost hunter, persons with dementia, etc. Each of these will behave quite differently when lost. Additionally, terrain and climate influence lost person behavior and, subsequently, the associated search data.Chp 5, Lost Person Strategies, and Chp 6, Myths and Legends, in my opinion, are the most useful/interesting for the layperson. Chp 6 contained my favorite anecdote from the author, and sums up a common idea that the book might be able to teach that if one were to, "go to the median distance, downhill 300 feet... the (lost) subject will be sitting next to an oak tree."Chp 8 contains search data specific to SAR, but I found that the category descriptions held very interesting facts about each group -- e.g., those affected by dementia tended to travel in a straight line.Chp 10 concluded the book with the case study of a successful 5-day search. The study summarizes how proper implementation of the data tools can narrow the search area, refine search team communications, etc.From the author, "In order to find the lost person you must look in the right place. Lost person behavior is one of the most important tools in determining where to look."

It is amazing what a multi-disciplinary search can turn up. My research is on the non-emergency cognitive and wayfinding behavior of healthy individuals in non-architectural environments, which does intersect strongly with lost person behavior. (In that, being lost in the wilderness is a not-uncommon though most often ephemeral part of the experience of navigation in the back county.) Whereas the purpose of this book is to inform search and rescue personnel, it also represents an impressive attempt to model the behavior of lost persons. General approaches to being lost such as random travel, direction traveling, direction sampling, and staying put (among many others) are defined, and then drawing on the International Search and Rescue Incident Database (the knowledge of generations of searchers from around the world based on specific case outcomes) Koester analyses the behavior of different categories of people in order to extract rule of thumb regarding anticipated behavior. These categories include some you might expect, such as campers, climbers, despondents, autistics, and substance abusers, but also a range of others that you might not expect such as gatherers, cavers, anglers and abductees. There are lessons here for Information Technology professionals as well, in terms of both data collection and data federation from varying agencies with different search and rescue ontologies (or different cultural understandings of the same ontologies!) drawn from different parts of the world. (Well, lessons in the problems thereof, about which Koester gives a good analysis.) Though it is really a handbook, it is well sourced and I feel it is as useful to academics working on related wayfinding cognition issues as it is to search and rescue planners and first responders.

Useful for finding different categories of lost persons

Im a Search and Rescue Wilderness Instructor, Wilderness First Aid Instructor, EMT, and Air Force Basic Inland SAR Course Graduate.I say all that to say, this is an absolutely awesome tool, probably one of the most important pieces I go everywhere with on SAR missions. This piece of text is deadly accurate, and very needed when your trying to figure out the psychology of the person that is lost, very much used in triangulation.very worth purchasing two.

The book is great, but the way they bound it is simply bizarre and very impractical.

This a must-have volume if you are at all interested in Search And Rescue. This is a thick volume with detailed statistics on all different types of lost people: children, adults, elderly; hunters, hikers, demented, mentally ill; type of terrain; etc. How far do the travel? In which direction? Survival statistics by the hour. I love data, so this book is a dream come true. If you are going to be doing SAR, you *definitely* want this book so you will understand how to conduct the most effective search to bring your subject home safe, as quickly as possible.

A scholarly work that will help direct efforts to refine search criteria and increase probability of successful searches. Some of this is intuitive, but this book points out the reason it is intuitive and that is helpful.

A recommended textbook for volunteers for the Severn Area Rescue Association. This is an absorbing read for anyone interested in the behaviour of missing persons, the ongoing evolution of this understanding and the influence of cultural as well as medical and other factors.

This is an excellent book, used by all SAR teams in AB, Canada as THE reference to carry. My first time in an operations centre convinced me of that. Quickly allows you to narrow search areas and concentrate resources for best effect and avoids "tunnel-vision" thinking processes so your tactics evolve as your search information changes. This reference keeps you from having to "re-invent the wheel" each time you go out allowing managers, Operations Directors, and police to ask the right questions to get the best answers and clues. However, it is best to get this in conjunction with the map workbook.

Working with ground search and rescue, this is religiously used by our Incident Command Team. The author has collected statistics over many years and has developed guidelines to use in lost person incidents. It's actually a interesting read and provides a wealth of information. I can tell you that the book is very accurate and is partially responsible for numerous successful located persons.If you are employed in a field where locating people may be part of your responsibility, then I strongly suggest you read this book. It is very relevant, extremely well organized and is also supported by an app to facility the process.

If you are interested in Search and Rescue and want to increase your probability of finding a lost person, this is the book for you! An enormous amount of data has been compiled to give you a shortcut to successfully employ your resources in a Search an Rescue operation.operation

Très bon livre avec beaucoup de compilationde statistiques.Une référence universelle très utilisé.