Adventure Challenge Week 6

Congratulations to the Week Six Adventure Skills Challenge Winners (Shelter Building) who are

TEAM CORKY!

This is Team Corky’s second victory in the 7-challenge series. Second place were Directionally Challenged (who have also previously won a round) so this week’s prize package will be going out to the third place team, Team Peterson. These teams all built great shelters as did many other teams.

Below is the scoring table for this challenge and the overall standings after the sixth round. The contest for the overall winner is still wide open with the judging of the final round to come. Apologies for the delay in getting these results out. We’ve been busy over the long weekend participating in Golden Spike Days. We’re expecting to get the final round scoring out later this week!

Shelters were judged on a number of different criteria: Size suitability, floor bedding, waterproofness, natural materials, wind resilience and wind sheltering, external signaling, safety from natural hazards, supplemental commentary, use of existing natural features, video quality, structural impressiveness and market research.

There were a lot of really great shelters and it was obvious that teams had well researched construction options and executed their building efforts very effectively. Every team showed they exercised “no trace” with documented tear-down. Looks like everyone had a lot of fun doing this!

Here are some images of some of the best shelters:

One take away from this exercise is that constructing a natural shelter takes a lot of time and effort. It is far more efficient to carry a lightweight shelter with you (examples researched). At the end of a day (that’s gone wrong) daylight is at a premium, and weather conditions may have deteriorated. This is when having shelter quickly becomes really important. A ready made shelter is instant, but if forced to build a natural shelter it can be really helpful to find a natural feature which has done most of the work for you.

Another point that most teams missed is the importance of putting out signs for search and rescue for when you are hidden in your shelter. Arrows made of natural features or flagging tape can point searchers to you if you are hidden in your shelter and unable to hear well.

Here are the prizes to be awarded to this week’s winners.

This week’s prizes are: (a big thank you to this week’s sponsors)

Unfortunately we didn’t manage to get any prize packages out during the chaos of Golden Spike. However, we are hoping to hold a special all-team prize award event including a debriefing and Q&A. Watch this space for more details!

Best regards,

Steve Chapman

Director of Community Education

Coquitlam Search and Rescue