What Happens When You Train Rope Rescue With No Anchors?

Training rope rescue in the Utah desert sounds extreme — until you realize it's the best way to actually learn. No trees, limited anchors, and unforgiving terrain force you to build clean, redundant systems and understand why they work. That's exactly why we keep coming back to Hanksville for our annual REMS training with Prevail Rescue Solutions.

In this episode, we break down what a full week of desert rope rescue training looks like on the ground — from day-one cobwebs to day-four momentum — and why the night slot canyon run has become our favorite confidence test for the whole crew.

🪢 IN THIS EPISODE:
Why limited anchors make better riggers
Night slot canyon travel as a team-building tool
How reps on shoddy anchors actually build real confidence
Patient packaging details that matter when it's dark and everyone's tired
What we like (and question) about the KOBUS RollUP Litter
Marlow Tactical rope impressions and strength talk
How multi-day scenarios sharpen communication and leadership
What we're tracking from NWSA and WEMS conferences
VIPER ordering changes and REMS typing questions heading into fire season
Why The Journeyman is more than a recruiting tool — and how teams use it for resource tracking, shift tickets, and season history

🔥 CONNECT WITH PREVAIL RESCUE SOLUTIONS:
You can reach Brian and the Prevail Rescue team directly through the app.

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KOBUS RollUP Litter
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Prevail Rescue Solutions
https://www.prevailrescue.com/

[00:00:00] Why Train Where There Are No Trees
[00:03:55] Testing The COBUS Litter System
[00:06:27] New Rope Options And Strength
[00:14:52] Conferences And Big Industry Changes
[00:23:10] Track Your Season Then Get Back To Work

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

When we tell people they're like, wait, you go to the middle of the desert to practice rope rescue and it's like yeah, there are limited anchors out here. It is prime anchor building.

SPEAKER_01 0:10

We've definitely had people talking shit like there's not fires in the desert. Why are they training in the desert? Well, I don't know, because if you can make an anchor out here where there's no fucking trees, when you're at a forest fire and there's a billion trees, you're probably not gonna have issues with your anchor building.

SPEAKER_00 0:26

So or when those trees get burned over, you know, you're not gonna be lost in the dust trying to figure out what to anchor to or how to build your system and have confidence. Everyone's a fucking critic. Oh yeah. Until they come out here and do it. Yeah, we kind of had a long night out here in uh Hanksville, Utah at our annual REMs training. We did what'd we do last night? Last night we ran a canyon, which is probably the funnest thing we do out here each time. At least that's the consensus among everyone that comes. It's like, oh, that's the best time. Yeah. And it really is. If you've never gone in some of these slot canyons at nighttime with a big group, it's it's a good team building exercise. It does build a lot of confidence on ropes. I think that was one reason why we initially did it was team building and confidence because you're just getting a lot of reps in on some shoddy anchors.

SPEAKER_01 2:06

And it's just fun to obviously it's beautiful here, but there's like a whole nother world that lives below the surface here that you can't see until you get into it.

SPEAKER_00 2:18

Yeah, and they're great canyons out here, tons of good training too. Like um I'm always blown away at what we can the scenarios and situations we can set up out here. Yeah. Um, so it's been really good.

SPEAKER_01 2:30

Shout out to Prevail Rescue Solutions for doing it with us once again. Yeah. We love training with Brian and his guys. It's been, I think we've done seven courses with them now.

SPEAKER_00 2:43

Between here and the Black Hills, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:45

One in San Diego, two in the Black Hills, and this is our fourth time in Hanksville, Utah with Brian. Obviously, we find it worth the investment.

SPEAKER_00 2:56

We do get some pushback, or not maybe not pushback, but uh when we tell people, they're like, wait, you go to the middle of the desert to practice rope rescue, and it's like, yeah, there are limited anchors out here. Yeah, it is prime anchor building.

SPEAKER_01 3:12

Um We've definitely had people talking shit like there's not fires in the desert. Why are they training in the desert? Yeah. Well, I don't know, because if you can make an anchor out here where there's no fucking trees, when you're at a forest fire and there's a billion trees, you're probably not gonna have issues with your anchor building.

SPEAKER_00 3:32

So exactly. Or when those uh trees get burned, excuse me, burned over, you know, you're not gonna be lost in the sauce trying to figure out what to anchor to or how to build your system and and have confidence. So everyone's a fucking critic. Oh yeah. Until they come out here and do it, yeah, and then they would see. Also, shout out to we've been messing with the new uh COBIS. COBIS litter system. The litter system has been super cool. It has been. Definitely has some things that we like, some things that we're still kind of working through to see if we like.

SPEAKER_01 4:10

Um, what was badass about COVID is we did bend that one little bracket on the holes, the grommet holes, and Brian shot him a text, and like five minutes later, the guy's like, I'll have one to you tomorrow. And he literally did. We're and we're in the middle of fucking nowhere. Yeah, I don't know how.

SPEAKER_00 4:30

It's super cool.

SPEAKER_01 4:31

They pulled that off, but yeah, instantly replaced it and said, We'll keep sending them until you stop breaking them.

SPEAKER_00 4:39

So and we love to test new stuff.

SPEAKER_01 4:41

Shout out to Cobus Litter Systems.

SPEAKER_00 4:43

That's they're fucking cool, man. Yeah, I like their setup. I like the at the head, how they kind of have those binding brackets that curl over the head to protect your patient. Yeah, the bull nose thing that kind of comes up and protects your patient. And then their inflatable pillow that goes with it, which is great for patient packaging. You know, you can keep your thermal wrap and patient padding more towards their torso and and hips and legs, and then they can still have a really good head support. Um, I also like that they have the um oh, what is it called? The two sides to the the built-in horizontal litter. Yeah, the built-in horizontal litter with it.

SPEAKER_01 5:22

I like that a lot too, because like on the sked, you either you have to like carry those straps with you, and then if you run them underneath the sked, like you can't really keep them pre-staged under the sked, because if you end up dragging a patient, you're just gonna thrash those straps. It's just one extra thing to carry. And the straps are different. You gotta remember it does clearly say head strap on the head side, but you know, in the dark and in a high stress time, you could get those backwards, and COPUS just makes it kind of dummy-proof.

SPEAKER_00 5:56

Yeah, and like you said, you have to keep track of the straps. I can't tell you how many times I've opened up a sked bag and yeah, one's gone, they're gone, one's there. And they're dragging uh they're dragging straps that run through the head. Yeah, super long. Eight people can carry, two people can drag.

SPEAKER_01 6:15

Like Yeah, you definitely feel like when you're the whole team's carrying people that you're not stepping on each other. With those eight straps, fucking makes moving people way easier. It does.

SPEAKER_00 6:27

And what was the the new rope that we have out here? Marlow Tactical. Marlow Tactical. And super impressive.

SPEAKER_01 6:34

I really like it. I wanted to try it for a long time, and then someone brought it and we're able to try it. It's been working out well. The braking strength on it's crazy. It's like 35 or 36 kilonewtons. What's Havoc again? I don't remember, 27, 28, somewhere in there, yeah. So it's definitely still love that. It's still plenty super strong, and we're gonna keep running that too. But I think just with the rumors of that maybe going away sometime soon, that the Marlowe might be our new rope. So yeah. But overall, the training has been awesome. Um it's always cool to see like on day one, we come together and kind of knocking the cobwebs off and you know, making some mistakes and working through things, and then here we are on day four of five, and it's really coming together.

SPEAKER_00 7:36

Yeah. Feeling like a well-oiled machine. Flying through a bunch of scenarios. I mean, and they're going through, you know, two or three different scenarios in the morning, then a couple classes, then another two or three different scenarios. They're packaging live patients, uh, rescuing dummies from crevices under rocks, debris, crush injuries. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:00

Um doing cool medical stuff too. I mean Brian brings all the the training tools and good people too.

SPEAKER_00 8:10

Yeah. Every year we meet some new individuals either, you know, working for Prevail, um, or that are kind of just coming in and providing another um another perspective and more information uh on some of these systems and different ways to do things.

SPEAKER_01 8:28

Yeah, I keep wanting to try other rope rescue classes, but just can't do it just because we have such a good time and it's so impactful in great training with Brian and Prevail that I just we're in a monogamous relationship.

SPEAKER_00 8:47

Yeah, exactly. That's a good way to put it. I can't step out on Brian. No. So yeah, we I mean, it's it's our main training that we do each year, but where we try and get the majority of of our guys out, and and even some fill-ins or new people. Um God, just trying to list them all really quick. Blaze, Jet, Kelsey, Cam. Chase, Gus, Colin, Kaylee, Matt, Jeff, Jeff.

SPEAKER_01 9:24

It's too many people. But the cool part is it's like nine of them are our returning guys, so we like have all trained together a lot. Built that camaraderie and teamwork through struggle. Like that fucking hike out of that canyon last night was pretty fucking brutal. It's yeah. But we all powered through, dude, and had some cold beers at the truck.

SPEAKER_00 9:52

Cold beers and some cigars. That's right. And you know, you get done, you you drop in the canyon. I think we got there probably around eight. We left we left the house at about 7 30, got there about eight. And we didn't get back up to the truck until one.

SPEAKER_01 10:09

One something in the morning, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:11

Yeah, you know, pitch black out in the middle of the desert. It's super cool. But yeah, you're smokes scrambling up those rock faces. And yeah, I always forget. I think last year I was more aware of it, where like every rappel down, all I was thinking about is damn, I have to hike out of this. Really? Yeah, it kind of took away. But this year I spaced it and just enjoyed each of the I know.

SPEAKER_01 10:36

I've done those in previous years too, like, fuck, we gotta walk all that. But last night it was just vibing, not even thinking about it. And then you get to the bottom, like, alright, well, let's fucking hike out.

SPEAKER_00 10:47

Done it before, yeah. And that was the other thing, is like we've ran that canyon. Did there's different routes in that canyon, but we've ran that canyon before. Not everyone on our group. Um, it was new for quite a few of them, but knowing that you can do it, you're like, whatever, you know, there's some 45, 50 degree just slippery rocks screwing up mountain. Uh yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:11

Um I wish there was canyoneering where we lived because it's something I definitely would do as a as a hobby. That's why I love this trip so much. It's crucial for our training as Minuteman to get ready, our team ready for the fire season and have that confidence going into the season that we've trained before and all together and we know each other, and it's cool now. We're seeing like the teams are communicating in different ways, like they don't have to communicate as much. It's just they're more personal knows what this person's gonna do.

SPEAKER_00 11:49

Yeah, there's like less said but more done. And we've even been able to, you know, s switch up our teams because it doesn't always work out that the four people you have planned as team one or team alpha or whatever even get to go out at the same time. So you know, a couple days set as one team and then the next day we swap it up, new team lead. They're still using, you know, a good pace plan, they're familiar with the systems that each and every one of them is. You know, if someone ends up, you know, if your team lead ends up having to go down to provide patient care, someone up top knows exactly what's going on. Um it's just super, super cool to see everyone kind of, like you said, knock off the cobwebs and then click and then continue to excel and exceed in some of these situations. Like we were having some pretty complex 34-minute rescues, and that's that's from call, hiking out to patient, setting up the system, getting down, providing patient care, packaging, then hauling, you know, or whatever we're doing. They're just they're crushing it out here.

SPEAKER_01 12:53

Yeah, I'm really proud of the guys. It's uh especially we're just so lucky to have so many returners, you know. Like turnover is a big thing in this industry, and then a lot of teams out there end up getting thrown together that have never worked together, but we have for whatever reason, people decide to stick around, and we've got you know nine returners here that have all worked together and they're gonna continue to work together. It is a training trip, and I highly recommend anyone out there to pay attention to the journey man and uh look out for this class next year. March, April time frame is when Brian's usually throwing it on.

SPEAKER_00 13:34

But you can always, if you're a larger organization that maybe you already have your your set of guys, um you can always reach out to Brian and Prevail Rescue.

SPEAKER_01 13:43

Yeah, I don't even look at it as training. It is training, but I kind of look at it as like I'm where we are taking our like our friends on a vacation, honestly. Yep. It definitely makes it easier to pay for when it's such a good time and good training. So again, I think we've kind of hit it pretty hard, but I can't recommend this class enough with Brian and Prevail Rescue Solutions. Yep. Catch him here in Hanksville, Utah, or he runs classes out in uh San Diego quite frequently, and he'll also come to you and your venue.

SPEAKER_00 14:20

So if you have a location that that you want to run your crew through, they'll come out, scout the area, you know, bring all the tools necessary and provide a quality quality training. Um you can find him on Instagram, we'll make sure we tag them, but you can obviously find them on the journey man. Yeah. Um, you know, search for companies, type in Prevail, their their contact information will be right there, or you can message them directly through the app.

SPEAKER_01 14:46

Yeah, he's been whenever he has a class, he posts it, so just keep an eye on TJM for Prevail Rescue Solutions. So we've had a really busy month of March, we're in, right? Um let's see, in February we went to the Afka conference. A couple weeks later, we went to the NWSA conference in Reno. Yes. A few days later hit the WEMS conference in Grand Junction, and then we rolled right into this. Uh gave any big takeaways from any of those conferences we went to.

SPEAKER_00 15:21

Obviously, with NWSA, and we've touched on this a little bit. Um there's some up in the air with the EA and um narcotics as well as REMs going into Viper. Which just happened, thank I. Yeah, the the solicitation just dropped. It's official. For those that don't know what Viper is or are unfamiliar, it's the ordering system um that the Forest Service uses. And in previous years, you know, REMs is kind of a newer asset getting integrated into FIRE. Um they kind of go out on by case special contracts, you know, EERA or um Ames was the organization doing it, but now it's going into Viper, so it's a little more standardized. People are gonna have to type it out. Um type one, main difference there is extrication equipment, type two without extrication equipment, and then their type three is what they're kind of making a rat team potentially a medmod. It sounds like that's still up in the air, so it'll be interesting to see how and if med mods are ordered this year. Um, but also like we've talked about um the type one versus type two, right? When you look at ambulances, most ambulances that are ordered are type two because type one, the only difference is hazmat, not really applicable, yeah, you know, and and not to mention if there was a serious hazmat issue, an ambulance isn't gonna be there to fix it, you know. They're gonna have to get a hold of someone else. So I'm curious this year to see with the extrication in type one. Is it gonna be a I'm just ordering a REMS team and I want the best, you know, most expensive, or are they gonna be strategically picking typing?

SPEAKER_01 17:12

The thing uh I love going to these conferences, but though it's like a little stressful because one, we're there to represent the journeyman and help spread the word about the product, get companies signed up to use the platform, do demos, but then we're also there as the owners of Minuteman trying to gather info on our industry and where it's headed and put our input in and all that, and then things like WEMS like I'm still a paramedic, I still want to sit in on some of these talks, so there's just like a lot uh going on. But what has been super cool is that almost almost everybody that gives us their attention for five minutes and lets us do a demo in front of them, they like you really see their eyes light up and like the gears turning, like, oh shit, this is a if they thought they knew what we did, they kind of realized they didn't. They didn't realize how much of a a business management software we are over like a recruiting tool. Right. And then uh they just it's fun to see people get it and get excited about it, yeah, and like see how they're gonna implement it in their business. They've given us ideas like, oh shit, we didn't really think of that.

SPEAKER_00 18:30

Um and like you said, they just a lot of people had a preconceived notion. Um maybe they saw us last year at one of the events, or they just haven't logged in in a while, and they're like, Oh, you're just uh hiring and training, and then they sit down at five-minute demo, and they're like, Wow, you know, it makes sense how you're tracking resources and the importance of tracking each individual resource in case there's issues, knowing where to find all your shift tickets, like and they and they reaffirm, like, wow, you know, I'm trying to do this over Excel for my roster and Google Drive, creating folders for my um documents and everything, and it's like signal to communicate or WhatsApp or we talked to some people that were paying oh tens of thousands of dollars for gear tracking alone. Yeah, not to mention all the other softwares, yeah. So it is very like you said, it's very rewarding when they take the time to see it and they get excited and they provide that feedback because we're very familiar with the the EMS and contractor side of this, but you know, we've had um prescribed fire uh, you know, nonprofit organizations come up, some of the largest hand crews, um, engine companies, big and small, coming up, and all of them are facing the same problems.

SPEAKER_01 19:52

A group of firefighters from Chile and Colombia and Argentina as well joined the platform. That's really cool. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:01

Um what about WEMS? So that's a little bit NWSA. WEMS was right before this. Yeah. Any any takeaways or things uh you were surprised about from WEMS.

SPEAKER_01 20:18

No, it was cool to see it grow uh from year one to year two. Hopefully it doubles again to from two to three and on and on. Compounding, I think it has a lot of potential to be a a great conference. It already is, but I think just as it gets bigger, it's gonna be better. Um it's been cool to show people who have seen it before, but it's been the app that is, but it's been a long time. Like, wow, things have wow, this has grown a lot. And like what I kept telling people was like, yeah, last year we were here selling you promises of what the journeyman's going to be, but now we're here to show you that we've delivered on those promises, and this is what it is now. So I think you know, the first year of TJM, very, very beta building, building it. Uh the 2024 fire season, the 2025 fire season was Minimani MS using it, proof of concept, proving the concept, and then now 2026 we're in is gonna be getting validation from uh you know all the companies that have joined the platform.

SPEAKER_00 21:37

100%.

SPEAKER_01 21:38

And then hopefully the next year it's like those companies are telling the people in their circle, and it's gonna spread like wildfire.

SPEAKER_00 21:46

Like wildfire. And even if you're not a company, if if you're just an individual firefighter, I always want to repeat it you can track your own season, you can create your own incidents and track your own season now. Spotlight days and dollars that does fall under the firefighter premium kind of side that we have. Um but still, I mean, even just this trip, we're talking about stories of previous fires, and there's so many times that I wish I knew the name of the fire or the location I went. Yeah. And I wish I had the journey man to track those things. So, you know, uh, if you're getting into it, like track that stuff, keep keep organized of where you've been, the fires you were on, so when you go back and travel through those places, you can stop through and maybe stop at your old DP. Yeah, I don't think you'll regret it, that's for sure.

SPEAKER_01 22:41

No keeping track of where you've been and what you've done. It's kind of like journaling in a way. Like, I wish I had journaled more on trips that I've gone on, or you know, wrote more down about stories from the fire line or whatever.

SPEAKER_00 22:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:57

But I think just being able to look back at like, oh yeah, that firefuck. That that was that was a good one. Or that one sucked, or I met whoever on this one. Um exactly. But I think uh it's time to get back to training. Yeah. So we'll wrap it up here and do another one soon. Hell yeah. It's been fun.