The 2025 Mountain Rescue Association (MRA) Annual Search and Rescue (SAR) Exercise took place June 12 – 15 in the headlands of Marin County, just a few miles from San Francisco’s iconic Golden Gate Bridge. Hosted by the Marin County Sheriff’s Search and Rescue team, this year’s event was held at NatureBridge Golden Gate, a location praised for both its accommodations and unique access to a range of field training environments.
“This was a very hands-on, practical conference,” said Michael St. John, unit leader for Marin County SAR. “From the aviation operations track to, perhaps for the first time ever, micro blasting demonstrations—where we actually conducted small rock detonations—this year offered participants real-world skills in a realistic environment. The most popular sessions were the rope rescue stations, where people got dynamic instruction from some of the best in the business.”
Marin County Sheriff Jamie Scardina welcomes MRA members to the 2025 SAR Exercises. Photo Credit: Michael St. John
More than 400 SAR professionals and volunteers from more than 96 agencies attended the event, with participants traveling from across the U.S.—including Pennsylvania, New Jersey, North Carolina, Alaska, Nevada, Idaho, and Washington. The honor for farthest traveled went to Eugenio Ricra, who joined from Peru representing both his SAR and fire brigade team.
“My favorite part was learning about the modern equipment and how best to use it,” said Ricra. “For example, we just received a new litter, which has greatly reduced rescue time on our trails. I hope to take what I’ve learned here and apply it back home in Peru.”
This year’s exercise offered an impressive 73 courses, covering topics from Technical Rope Rescue and Search Management to K-9 operations, Aviation in SAR, Technology in SAR, Animal Rescue, and much more.
The conference unofficially began earlier in the week with a series of in-depth, multi-day pre-training courses. These sessions included specialized classes such as Lost Person Behavior taught by Robert Koester, Family Liaison Training, Small Diameter Rope Rescue, and a comparative course on Highline vs. Crosshaul systems.
Frank Gerber, who attended both the Lost Person Behavior and Family Liaison courses, found the pre-trainings especially valuable. “What I really appreciated was the ability to dive into the material and learn from experts who in some cases literally wrote the book,” he noted.
Among the many highlights of the event were two standout moments. The first was the “Women in SAR” gathering on Friday evening, sponsored by Arc’teryx. The event celebrated the achievements of women in rescue, offering a platform for storytelling, camaraderie, and inspiration. “It was really fun to connect with other female SAR professionals from around the country and hear their stories,” said co-organizer and youth SAR member Riley Ericksen. “As someone who is a bit younger and just starting in SAR, I found it incredibly uplifting and empowering.”
Celebrating Women in Rescue After Party. Photo Credit: Scott McDaniel
The second marquee moment came on Saturday evening with the keynote address delivered by Katjarina “Katja” Hurt of the Seattle Mountain Rescue Resilience Team. Hurt reflected on a tragic 2018 incident involving the death of a climber and explored the concept of the “Halo Effect” — the tendency to overestimate someone’s expertise or safety because of past successes or perceived competence. She expanded the idea of a halo to include places or experiences, like a regular hike or common climbing route. Her talk challenged attendees to rethink leadership and student empowerment in outdoor education, turning tragedy into actionable insight for SAR teams nationwide.
Complementing the educational offerings was a bustling Vendor Village, where more than 22 vendors—including Garmin, Land Rover, Arc’teryx, CalTop, Black Diamond and others—showcased the latest in SAR gear and services. Among them was Rocky Talkie, makers of rugged backcountry communication devices, who used the conference to highlight their annual Search & Rescue Award, a grant program for volunteer SAR teams.
“We’re a small company and haven’t been able to attend an MRA event until now,” said Erin Moeller, CMO at Rocky Talkie. “But this really aligns with our mission, and it was exciting to meet and support teams—especially those who were recipients in our last grant cycle.”
Rocky Talkie at the vendor village. Photo credit: Scott McDaniel
Amid all the gear, training, and inspiration, one theme emerged as the heart of this year’s event: connection. Whether it was sharing techniques in the field, exchanging stories over dinner, or making lifelong professional contacts, participants repeatedly emphasized how meaningful it was to gather and learn from like-minded individuals dedicated to a shared mission.
As summed up by Hannah Zuroff of Contra Costa SAR, “I learned so much it was crazy …. just a lot about different aspects of SAR. It was really interesting to learn how teams do different things.”
Kobe Pole, Incident Commander for this year’s conference, said feedback about this year’s conference was all extremely positive. “Hopefully we created a great learning environment for all of those who attended,” Pole said. “It truly took a village to make this event happen and I’d like to offer big thank you to all of the individuals and teams who attended; the dozens of people who worked tirelessly behind the scenes to make it all possible and the allied agencies who were kind enough to lend us their time, resources and land for this important event.”
Next year’s MRA conference will take place June 12 – 14 in Juneau, Alaska.
