Chaffee Co Search & Rescue E-Mountain Bike

Chaffee County Search and Rescue-North (CCSAR-N) has been in existence since 1964.  We provide backcountry search and rescue (SAR) services for the northern 2/3 of Chaffee County, which has ten 14,000' mountains. Chaffee County has more 14ers than any other county in the lower 48 and ~700 square miles of public lands.   We provide swiftwater rescue for the upper Arkansas, the most boated section of river in the state with the highest number of SAR incidents. We are a non-profit that is part of the Chaffee County Sheriff's Office. We depend completely on contributions, grants and fundraisers to support our efforts. Our organization is all volunteer with ~60 members. We have never charged and never will charge for our services.  

We transport patients by various means (rescue sled behind snowmobile or ATV, carried litter, boat, horse, SUV, snow cat, hike out) to front country ambulances or to air ambulance landing zones.  We have missions involving hikers, climbers, skiers, snowshoers, mountain bikers, dirt bikers, ATVers, Jeepers, snowmobilers, horseback riders, downed aircraft, kayakers and rafters. Drones with thermal imaging and visual cameras are used in many of our search missions. We also have an educational outreach to the community to help people recreate safely in the backcountry. 

We are raising funds for the purchase of an E-mountain bike, which will allow us to locate and treat victims in as little a third of the time it takes a hiking team. E-mountain bikes are becoming a state-of-the-art tool for search and rescue organizations

August 2022 rescue on Ellingwood Ridge on Mt LaPlata