KUNA, Idaho — With summer just around the corner, as temperatures rise, so will the number of floaters on Indian Creek — and Kuna Fire is making sure crews are ready for any water emergencies that come up.
“People usually get in trouble on Indian Creek because they underestimate some of the rapids,” explained Captain Brandon Neice with Kuna Fire.
Neice said the department trains multiple times a year to make sure they're ready for the rare, but highly technical water rescue.
WATCH | See how Kuna Fire is training for water rescues in Indian Creek—
“Getting trained right now is getting ahead of the curve, and every year we see more and more floaters and we have more and more incidents on the water,” he observed.
Indian Creek can be deceptively dangerous, hiding hazards just below the surface. Over the winter, while the creek was empty, debris such as barbed wire, sheet metal, and metal cables became visible.
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“We have a lot of boulders throughout the middle of this creek that they’re not visible from here, but if you try to stand up in there, it really poses an entrapment problem for people,” Neice said.
That danger turned deadly last summer when a Kuna woman drowned while floating the creek. Neice said those kinds of incidents are driving training drills this year.
“All the trainings that we’ve done throughout the past three days have been mock-ups of incidents that have happened here, and for every one of those, there’s always a better way to solve a problem, there’s always a faster way to solve a problem, and that’s what we’re here to find out — we’re re‑creating those incidents,” Neice said.
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The multi-day course combined classroom learning with hands-on scenarios to keep Kuna Fire’s swift water rescue team sharp.
“We had last year an entrapped victim, and so we went over as many different ways that we could affect that rescue differently,” said swift water rescue instructor Tren Long.
Long said these rescues require precise teamwork to keep firefighters and the public safe.
“Statistically, swift water rescue is the most dangerous rescue that firefighters do, and it’s also the most rare that they do, so it’s a high-risk, low-frequency rescue, which is a nightmare, just because they don’t get the opportunity to do it that much,” Long said.
Kuna Fire recommends wearing a life jacket and using a sturdy raft that won’t easily be punctured by low-hanging branches to stay safe on the water this summer.
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