Rescue Department, Andy Tucker

The services provided by Warren County Rescue include, but are not limited to: Search&Rescue, Water Rescue, and Dive Rescue/Rescovery. The Warren County Rescue Department offers the citizens of Warren County, as well as the citizens of The Commonwealth of Kentucky, a group of highly dedicated, motivated, and trained individuals who all share the same objective - Saving Lives.

Becoming a part of the team can be challenging, but it is worth it. You will get to meet new friends and learn exciting skills. Skills that can make a person marketable in different career fields.

The process can be summed up in two basic steps. The first step is to work with a recruiter. The second is to attend orientation.

When you work with a recruiter you will submit an application and sit through an interview/oral board. This is where in the process it will be decided whether or not you are accepted for orientation. Orientation is where new recruits are given a wealth of information about what the department does and how it operates.

After orientation is complete new recruits are placed in the Search&Rescue division as active duty personnel. They are also put on a 90 day probationary period. This is a time for new recruits to decide whether or not the department is right for them, and it is also a time for the department to decide if the new recruit is right for the department. Once the probationary period is completed new recruits can pursue more advanced training in the other divisions.

Search&Rescue

The Search&Rescue Division specializes in locating lost, missing, or overdue persons in wilderness and urban environments. Whether it is a child lost in the woods or a person who failed to return home from a hunting trip, Search&Rescue is there to locate these people and bring them to safety.

Normal emergency scenes for police, fire, and EMS are contained to a small area, often no bigger than a house and the property it's on. In Search&Rescue, the emergency scene can be a few square miles or as as big as the entire city and county. To deal with such large scenes, we have a mobile command post that can be set up in the field to manage the Search&Rescue operations. Our staff are trained in ground search techniques, survival, lost person behavior profiling, managing search operations, land navigation, man tracking, and many other disciplines. 

Water Rescue

The Water Rescue Division specializes in locating lost, missing, or overdue persons engaging in any recreational water activity or flooding event. It can be as simple as finding a boater who has engine problems, or sending in rescue swimmers after a child being swept away in flood waters. 

We maintain three motor-powered watercraft for water rescue responses, as well as non motor-powered watercraft. Our staff are also trained in water survival, Swift Water Rescue, Inland Water Rescue, SONAR operations, and other disciplines.

Dive Rescue&Recovery

The responsibilities of the dive team are similar to the water rescue division, however the dive team operates below the surface of the water. They do their work at the bottom of the rivers and lakes. The dive team maintains a rescue status mode at all times. Unfortunately a vast majority of drownings are fatal, however there is always a fighting chance. During the colder season there is an increased chance of what is known as "Cold Water Resuscitation." Victims have been underwater for more than thirty minutes and successfully revived. 

The dive team is also responsible for locating other objects of interest. Our team routinely assists law enforcement agencies with the recovery of evidence. We maintain a group of divers who are trained as Underwater Criminal Investigators. These divers have recovered weapons used in the commission of crimes, resulting in successful convictions. 

Cave Rescue

The Cave Rescue Division is responsible for locating lost and injured persons in a cave environment. This team operates anywhere from a few hundred feet below ground to several miles underground. Cave environments can be very rough, with vertical shafts dropping hundreds of feet, and the cave system filling with moving water. Cave rescues can be very slow and deliberate operations. A team could go underground and not come back until a day later. Our staff train with the National Cave Rescue Commission and often go on caving excursions to stay current with the skilled rescue disciplines of cave rescue. 

High/Low Angle Rescue

Within Warren County the natural and man made features of the environment present the public with certain hazards of which occasionally present life threatening emergencies to individuals. The High/Low Angle team is capable of responding to these environments to reach victims and bring them to safety by using a system of ropes, webbing, pulleys, carabiners, and other devices.

The disciplines learned in the high/low angle division are also used in the other divisions. The equipment and skills are used in cave rescue, where there are vertical shafts. It is used in swift water rescue, where high lines and mechanical advantage systems are erected. Even divers use some of the skills for rigging recovery devices to objects underwater. In all actuality, the mere basics of high/low angle are used in almost every day life.