After the conclusion of BSARD’s involvement in a Missing Person Incident and the teams have been sent home, a senior member of the team will compile and generate an After Action Report.
The report is intended to be a formal document explaining our involvement with the incident; why we were there, what tasks we performed, and what interpretive observations we made of our K9’s behavior. In some events we may point out extenuating factors that may have influenced the behavior.
The report is intended to be as “facts only” as possible. We do not speculate on what may or may not have happened to the missing person nor do we include any subjective opinions regarding how the search was conducted or who was involved.
An After Action Report typically contains the following information:
- BSARD’s Incident ID number (for reference) and the date(s) of our response.
- Whom the report is being prepared for and their organization.
- Who prepared the report.
- Which BSARD resources (Handlers, K9s, and any support or operations staff) responded and their roles.
- If we called in other volunteer SAR resources in a mutual assistance situation, we include those persons and K9s as well.
- A summary of the mission request and the scope of our involvement.
- A summary of activities performed by our resources for each Operational Period.
Depending on the availability of additional information, attachments to the report are also often provided. These attachments typically include:
- An aerial view or map of the search area.
- For the last several years BSARD has been using CALTOPO as our operational mapping system, assuming cell phone coverage. If cell coverage is not an option we use Garmin hand-held GPS receivers. In either case we are able to overlay trails and areas covered by our teams as well as waypoints marking points of interest or clues.
- Our K9s wear Garmin Alpha GPS collars. which allow us to track K9 activities and overlay them onto the map once they return from the field.
- Copies of task narratives from the handler(s) working the incident. These might be as simple as a print of an email, a copy of a written note, or as formal as a ICS Task Assignment Form.
- Copies of log forms used by BSARD’s command and control staff.
- Other documents as seem appropriate to illustrate BSARD’s involvement with the incident.