In 2003, Meredith Oppegard was sitting on the Eckerd College Search and Rescue docks when she, along with other rescue team members, was notified about a boat accident that occurred in the Tampa Bay area. A boat hit a marker in the water and the two passengers were flung from the boat. The man and woman were in the water, with the boat still going in circles around them.
When Oppegard and her crewmates arrived at the scene, the man said he thought he broke his back. The rescue team placed him on a backboard and then onto the rescue boat, which took him to the ambulance waiting on shore.
This incident is just one of the more memorable rescues Oppegard has done in her three years in EC-SAR.
The Eckerd College Search and Rescue Team, based in St. Petersburg, is a volunteer rescue team that assists vessels in distress with towing and firefighting, searching for overdue vessels, pulling vessels from aground and dewatering sinking vessels.
An average of 60 students participate in the program, but the 2004 school year had about 90 students because the freshman class was so big. Eckerd College is known for its search and rescue team, students typically hear about the program from the Web site and freshman orientation.
The program requires a two-year commitment from the participants, and each year the students learn how to perform different tasks associated with rescuing a vessel.
Freshman year, members spend the entire year training as crew. They then have the option of staying as crew or moving up in the ranks. Sophomore year, members become first mates, who act as the driver’s assistant. First mates go onboard the vessel in distress and act as public relations for the situation. They have the skipper, the vessel’s driver, fill out a consent form with his name and contact information. They also give the skipper a sticker with rescue team’s information on it, so the skipper can place it with the rest of his emergency information. Members spend their junior year in cocksen training, learning to drive the boat on low risk rescues. Senior year, rescue team members train to be boat captains who drive the boat in high-risk rescues.
“They’re constantly training for the next step,” says Jennifer DeMik, team’s coordinator.