White Water Rescue Technician Professional

The Whitewater Rescue Technician - Professional (WRT-PRO) course is designed for professional river users who require a rescue capability in a whitewater environment, eg raft guides, safety kayakers. Recreational paddlers should take the WRT-REC course.

Course length

3 days (18 hours) plus night exercise.

Course content includes

• Rescue 3 philosophy
• Training standards
• River hydrology and hazards (advanced)
• Personal equipment
• Technical and group equipment
• Pre-trip planning
• Risk assessments
• Incident size-up
• Incident management and site control
• Medical considerations
• Operating at night/ in poor visibility
• Introduction to searching rivers
• Communications
• Whitewater swimming techniques (advanced)
• Strainer swim
• Conditional rescues – throwbags (advanced)
• Shallow water techniques
• Complex entrapments and cinches
• True/contact rescues - untethered
• True/contact rescues - tethered
• Line crossing methods
• Tensioned diagonals/zip lines
• Flips, rights and crew/client recovery
• Complex boat pins and wraps
• Tethered boat techniques
• Victim/casualty management
• Knots and anchor systems
• Vector pulls
• Tensioning systems and mechanical advantage
• Simple belay systems
• Boat on a highline (optional)
• Scenarios

Prerequisites

• Confident swimmer, with whitewater experience (eg raft guide, canoeing, kayaking, canyoning, etc)
• Minimum age: 18

Taught by

• Whitewater Rescue Technician Instructor