This is a good reminder to practice with all the gear.
It's also interesting to try doing a group drill where one person takes charge and assigns roles etc. as you would need to do in order to have an orderly search and recovery in a real situation with a group.
So many little ways to have things be slowed down...
I forgot to mention that the feel of the probe hitting subsurface objects like branches, ice and other firmer but penetrable layers took some time to identify too. It was especially good practice to get the feel of what is down there. I offered to bury my search partner so I could get a good grasp of the feeling of a probe hitting a human, but he declined the offer. I seemed to spend a long time on things that ended up busting through eventually.
As we broke into groups (0f sometimes up to 8 persons) to search there was always a leader assigned. I have read about this all the time, and thought about it too, but until it is put into practice it can be slightly awkward at first. I found as time went on and I became the leader of groups it was easier to have a vision of what needed to be done to expedite a search with the max/min amount of separation and good communication between partners. Now, God forbid I can imagine what it takes to become useful and proactive if a member of our ski outing gets buried or disappears. I need to teach that to other members whom I tour with so we all have a game plan that is similar.
