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• Why a river rescue school
• S.A.F.E. story
• Who participates in our courses
• S.A.F.E. PHILOSOPHY- Rescue3™ standard
• S.A.F.E. distinctive elements: why should i choose S.A.F.E.?
• Where are the courses taking place?
• Which training should I choose?

Many years commitment with the river world through descents, explorations, seminars, consults and rescue operations led TOTEM ADVENTURE to found the first project of Swiftwater and Flood Education - Europe: S.A.F.E.

In 1999, David Alemanni and Eve Eichenberger start S.A.F.E.® in Italy, with the first school in Valle d’Aosta, then open a second center in Zurich, Switzerland.

The big sponsor of this project is TOTEM ADVENTURE, operating since 1992 in the outdoors with sport and adventure programs, focusing on white water disciplins like rafting, kayaking, canyoning and hydrospeed.

- People & Communities who live in potential flood risk areas
- Recreational boaters, professional river personnel (rafting guides, kayaking instructors, canyoning guides...)
- Professional rescuers, (Fire fighters, Search and Rescue personnel, military personnel, police, key leaders and instructors from other rescue groups...

Is to work with an easy, efficient, dynamic and up to date, shared Rescue Standard.
Speaking the same language, River Rescue involves several crucial skills and borrows techniques from different environments such as Alpine and caving rescue, industrial rope work, white water rafting and life saving swimming, just to mention a few.
Every ambience develops its own language and ideas. Such a wide range of competence quite often has led to confusion. And as we know, confusion, misunderstandings and mistakes in a rescue action can cause accidents and casualties.
RESCUE 3™ who is involved in River Rescue since the early '80s, has created a standard that meets perfectly the idea of S.A.F.E.®
This standard was developed by a group of active professionals from organizations responsible for search and rescue, river guiding, whitewater kayaking, lifesaving, police and fire fighting services.
It is now adopted in the States, Canada, Costa Rica, Mexico, Chile, Norway, Sweden, UK, Switzerland, Italy, Zaire, Zimbabwe, Nepal, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand; since 1999, meets the NFPA training as well as the OSHA recognition

We release official RESCUE 3™ certification, world wide recognized.

Methodical approach - our courses are not clinics or workshops but are comprehensive, competency-based programs.
Each course is delivered with a minimum of class time, skills are developed on the riverbank and in the water and all techniques are implemented in real scenarios.

ON TOP – In order to keep a high calibre teaching standard, our instructors constantly participate in conventions, seminars and trainings all over the world.
Our focus is on applying critical thinking about all the techniques. The emphasis is on encouraging students to become knowledgeable in principles and concepts of moving water and rope rigging, rather than learn them by rote.
Basically we provide recipes rather than a cooked meal!

Top quality gear – To ensure safety and demonstration quality, we use just the best selection of gear available on the market. (Petzl, Kong, Beal, Mammut, Cousin, Sterling, Conterra, Shockwave, Morice/Totem Adventure, Spencer,…), just to mention some.

KISS – Stands for Keep It Simple and Safe. As we think that the most important piece of equipment is knowledge, every technique is taught using basic and emergency gear as well as very sophisticated equipment. That gives a much wider range of options while performing a rescue.

International Team – We collaborate with a team of top professionals coming from all over the world.
All our instructors, besides teaching courses are actively involved in rescue operations. Most of our courses are held in English, German and Italian, most of our instructors are fluent also in Spanish and French.

Update & follow up – Due to the dynamic nature of our standards, certifications have 3 years validity. After that you should attend again the entire course.
We also offer one/two days follow up trainings, with real scenarios.

S.A.F.E. is equipped to operate practically anywhere where there is water.

Our advice is to attend the first two levels (SRT 1 and ADVANCED) near the Alps. There you can find reliable and constant water levels during all summer, which guarantees a maximum benefit for the participants. Piemont and Aosta Valley are ideal locations. (Also for wine and good food!)

For the specialized trainings we prefer to move to your home area, in order to support you with the know how custommade for your realities.

There is a big variety of possible trainings in the field of River Rescue and they can be very specific.
The criteria which determin the choice of training are basically related to:
1) Environment where you are operating:

- Type of water: rain, snowmelt...
- Type of water: white water, flood...
- Geomorfology: creeks, natural rivers, artificial channels...
- Cold, warm water...
- Personnel, preparation and availability

- Shore based rescues
- Water based rescues, contact rescues
- Boat-, Raft-, Cataraft-, River Board rescues
- Car Rescues in moving water
- Rope rescue (Low to high angle)
- ..................

Operating as a river rescue technician is dangerous!
For a rescuer to become part of the problem, instead of being the solution, can happen very fast.
Our policy is : "no matter for which type of river rescues you will be called to respond, we all start from the same page"
To respond safely and effectively to any rescue, the first priority for a rescue team is to build a common way of thinking and to speak the same language. These skills will be achieved in the SRT 1 (3 days) and consolidated during the SRT advanced.(4 days + 1 Night of SAR). After these two trainings you can choose how to specialize your know how and we will tailor a course which meets exactly your needs.

By following this progression, You will be surprised to see how the learning process will get smooth...and how dramatically the safety will improve in your team!