Free Safety Classes Available

We are offering FREE Mountain Safetly Classes at Snoqualmie, Stevens and Mission Ridge.  These courses are being paid for by the foundation created to  honor and remember my younger brother who passed away in 2005 at Alpental.  We want to educate people so that a tragety like his can be avoided.  Please take advantage of this opportunity and share it with a friend or kid you know who might benefit from this education.  This is the first round of what we hope will be many classes at multiple levels and locations. 

Here are the details:

MOUNTAIN SAFETY COURSES
The Foundation is pleased to announce sponsoring its first mountain safety course.  The course will also be sponsored by the Association of Professional Patrollers (“APP”) with the support and collaboration of The Summit at Snoqualmie, Stevens Pass and Mission Ridge Ski Area.  The course is FREE and will be given this year from 9:00 a.m. until 1:00 p.m. at Stevens Pass on March 14, Alpental at The Summit at Snoqualmie on March 21 and Mission Ridge on March 28.

The courses will emphasize ski area basics (know the code), skiing with buddies, tree well and deep snow safety and basic first-aid. Although the courses will be directed primarily to 10-15 year olds, others are welcome to register. Class size will be limited to no more than 25 students per class, and there will be at least 3 instructors for each class.

The primary instructors will be Cory Rubinfield (an APP certified ski patroller, professional ski patroller and medical trainer at Stevens Pass, AIARE Avalanche Instructor, and former high school science teacher and course director for Outward Bound Wilderness) and Kevin Marston (16 years professional ski patroller, currently at Alpental Ski Area at Snoqualmie, a Washington State DOT avalanche forecaster, and current president of the Backcountry Rescue Canines Association). The additional instructors will be from the three participating ski areas.

The APP was founded in 1971 to establish a hallmark for professional ski patrollers. It is comprised of nearly 500 professional and volunteer patrollers representing over 30 ski areas and resorts throughout the Western United States.  Its certification requires its members to pass exacting written and practical tests in a variety of areas, including skiing, medical, risk management, transceiver/avalanche rescue, ski area safety, and avalanche control.

The Foundation is grateful to APP, Stevens Pass, Alpental (Summit at Snoqualmie), and Mission Ridge for their support and invaluable participation in developing and sponsoring these courses. The Foundation, APP, and the three participating ski areas believe this is an important opportunity to cooperate with each other and to enhance communications between each organization for the benefit of all. The Foundation is also honored that the APP is co-sponsoring this effort. We look forward to a long, mutually beneficial association with both the APP and each of the ski areas.

Everyone involved in this effort is excited about expanding both the course content and the targeted group of participants in future years, as well as repeating courses directed to 10-15 year olds.

To sign up, please visit our site:

www.thedavidpettigrewmemorialfoundation.com/classes.shtml
Be sure to click to March on the Calender to register.....Once you see the class you want, click on it and you can register there.  Please bring the signed release to the class.

If anyone would like to donate to the organization as well, we welcome it.  Contact details are on the site. 

I really hope this is successful and that what we provide is helpful and well recieved by the community we hope to protect and educate.

Kevin

PS ... Please post any thoughts or ideas you have on what we are doing and or any additionaly things you would like to see us do/offer.

We are getting closer to the dates. Thank you to all who have already signed up. Currently we have 32 people signed up. Please, if you know any kids or adults that might benefit from this, please spread the word. We're doing our best to eliminate the posting "another skier/boarder dies".....Help us in anyway you can...

Look for more classes with varying degrees of levels of focus and content to be coming next year....

Thanks to everyone helping us....