National Defence Committee on June 15th, 2009

[The Chair, Conservative, Maxime Bernier]

Good day everyone and welcome to the 27th meeting of the Standing Committee on National Defence. Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2) and to the motion passed by the committee on Monday, February 23, 2009, we continue today our study of Canadian sovereignty in the Arctic.

We have with us two witnesses. We have with us Mr. John R. Davidson, president of the Civil Air Search and Rescue Association. We also have with us Colonel P. Drover, director of air force readiness and chief of air staff, from the Department of National Defence.

Thank you both for being with us.

We will start with Mr. Davidson, for seven minutes.

[John R. Davidson, President, Civil Air Search and Rescue Association]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

The Civil Air Search and Rescue Association, or CASARA, was established in 1986 as a Canada-wide volunteer association dedicated to the promotion of aviation safety and the provision of air search support services to the national search and rescue program. Our volunteers use their own aircraft or vehicles to provide this service and are reimbursed for their expenses.

CASARA is funded by a contribution agreement through Treasury Board and managed by DND. The contribution agreement is a five-year agreement outlining the services to be provided and the funding authorized for those services.

CASARA provides annual financial statements reviewed by our auditor. To date, all financial statements are unqualified and without opinion. This speaks very well of a volunteer organization that is managing public funds today.

We have member organizations in every province and territory. Our membership this past fiscal year was approximately 2,997, and members have contributed approximately 124,701 hours in volunteer time, training, and hosting safety seminars. Across this country, our volunteers have also participated in 254 actual SAR missions and 137 air and 117 ground taskings, involving some 4,577 volunteer hours.

These volunteers actively augment the Canadian Forces primary search and rescue assets during SAR missions by supplying spotters from military search aircraft and by providing pilots, navigators, spotters, and aircraft when called upon to do so by any of the three joint rescue coordination centres in Canada. We also aid local police and emergency management organizations with humanitarian assistance in looking for lost persons.

CASARA is managed by a volunteer board of 13 members. They are elected from each member organization in the country. This board is responsible for setting policy, managing our financial responsibilities, and setting training standards. The board meets twice a year to fulfill these responsibilities for our day-to-day running. The four-member board executive that is charged with the responsibility meets four times a year or as otherwise needed.

CASARA has developed our own training programs based upon the national SAR manual. Along with these training programs, we have set training standards and currency standards that our volunteers must meet before being authorized to work on actual SAR missions. We have developed certain training courses for each of our pilot, navigator, spotter, and search coordinator roles.

In order to be successful, CASARA uses a structure that breaks each member organization into zones and areas as needed. CASARA has approximately 104 zones across the country. A zone is the level at which all operations occur. Our certification, training, currency, and crewing all occur there. To ensure that each zone is compliant with our training certification and currency requirements, DND evaluates each zone. Our CASARA liaison officers assigned from the SAR squadrons are given this responsibility. On average, we successfully pass our zone evaluations approximately 97% of the time, and the other 3% are successful with immediate retraining.

We have developed an electronic computer-based CASARA management system to retain all of our data regarding our volunteers, their training records, and their currency status. As we work with a rolling 365 currency period, our volunteers' currency is continually being monitored, and training is adjusted to match the training needed. Appropriate courses are scheduled to ensure that everyone is provided the opportunity to maintain their currency.

All CASARA volunteers are certified to ensure that a high level of service can be provided to the Canadian Forces, but also to ensure that those in need have high-quality professionals searching for them. CASARA volunteers willingly agree to participate in searches where environments are challenging.

One of CASARA's greatest contributions to the Canadian Forces SAR assets is the local knowledge that pilots, navigators, spotters, ground personnel, and coordinators have of their respective areas. Our members might know of an airplane in an area, so that if an emergency locator transmitter alarms, we would have a good idea of where to look. This local knowledge may have the effect of quickly ending a search or allowing Canadian Forces aircraft to not participate, thereby reducing the workload on the SAR squadrons.

CASARA has developed an insurance program to provide protection for our volunteers. This program covers liability, accidents, injury on duty, and secondary aircraft hull insurance. This program will ensure that our volunteers are not left to their own resources, should they be injured during the course of their missions.

Complementing our insurance program are workers compensation boards. In almost all provinces and territories, our volunteers are recognized as emergency services workers, thus allowing the WCB in a province or territory to provide financial support should an unfortunate incident occur. We are still negotiating with one or two provinces or territories who are still reluctant to provide this coverage, even though the federal government will ultimately cover 75% of the cost of any claims.

The chief of review services, DND'S internal program auditor, has recently completed an audit of the CASARA program within DND. The chief determined that CASARA is a cost-effective program that saves both funds and scarce DND equipment and personnel resources. For example, since 2005 the cost of CASARA in support of SAR has been $85.20 per hour in the Halifax search and rescue region; $65.82 per hour in the Trenton search and rescue region; and $447.51 in the Victoria search and rescue region.

CASARA is involved in approximately 25% of the SAR cases, and we were reimbursed approximately $1 million for these efforts. However, if DND had performed these operations without the benefit of our CASARA volunteers and their aircraft, it would have cost about $30 million. These figures alone demonstrate the value the CASARA volunteer program brings to the SAR program. The cost of the CASARA program is 1.9% of the DND program costs for SAR.

Throughout the report, those interviewed rated the CASARA program as either indispensable or very relevant, which is a very positive endorsement of a civilian volunteer organization.

In fiscal years 2005 to 2009, we participated in 32 actual SAR incidents in the Arctic and Northwest Territories, 11 of them on the ground, for 1,250 hours of volunteer time; in Nunavut, in 20 air incidents, two of them on the ground, for 1,400 hours in total; and in the Yukon, in nine air incidents, four of them on the ground, for a total of 226 hours.

So we are available. We are out there and can provide any assistance that DND or emergency measures organizations request of us.

Thanks for the opportunity to present the story of CASARA.

Your questions will follow, I assume.

[The Chair, Conservative, Maxime Bernier]

Thank you very much, Mr. Davidson.

Now we'll give the floor to Mr. Drover, please.

[Colonel P. Drover, Director, Air Force Readiness, Chief of Air Staff, Department of National Defence]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee.

I was asked to speak today about search and rescue in the north. I'll start with a brief presentation on CF roles, responsibilities, and posture, and show you the activity rates we have recorded in recent years. I will be referring to search and rescue as SAR during my presentation.

I should mention there are multiple organizations and agencies involved in SAR response. The Canadian Forces and Canadian Coast Guard are responsible for aircraft and vessels in distress within coastal and marine waters. Parks Canada is responsible for lost and missing persons within national park boundaries. Each territory has the mandate for ground SAR--that is, the Yukon, Northwest Territories, and Nunavut, respectively. Volunteers play a significant role, as Mr. Davidson just pointed out. We rely heavily on CASARA to assist in our SAR operations.

I'd like to refer now to the slide deck I provided you, and I'm just going to make some brief comments on the various slides. The first one is entitled “Search and Rescue Regions and MRSC Locations”. We have three rescue coordinating centres serving Canada, depicted here at Victoria, Trenton, and Halifax. The area we're talking about includes offshore waters as well. We have 15 million square kilometres of area we are responsible for in search and rescue. This area essentially runs from the U.S. border to the North Pole, and 1,100 kilometres west of Vancouver and 1,600 kilometres east of Newfoundland. Three of our centres are co-manned by Canadian Forces and Canadian Coast Guard personnel, who are highly trained in search and rescue operations.

A SAR operation will start with notification. Notification passed to any of these rescue coordinating centres will trigger a series of events that ultimately will conclude with a successful or unsuccessful SAR mission, depending. Notification will come from various sources, such as NavCan, next of kin, or emergency locator transmitters, ELTs. I can elaborate on these later, if required.

The coordinating centres will task the most appropriate asset. It may be a Canadian Forces aircraft; it could be a coast guard vessel; and the navy may be involved, and other government department assets too, such as Transport Canada, and provincial and territorial assets. We often charter commercial helicopters, if they are the most logical and convenient resource to use. We use CASARA, as mentioned, and the Canadian Coast Guard Auxiliary. Often there's more than one search and rescue asset tasked in any particular search.

The next chart shows you where our bases are located. We're across the country, from Comox in the west to Gander in Newfoundland. We have primary bases, where our aircraft are on standby 24 hours, seven days a week; and we have secondary capability, such as at Cold Lake, Bagotville, and Goose Bay, where we have some search and rescue capability.

The next chart will show you the primary SAR aircraft resources we now employ and where they are based. These aircraft are all specially equipped for SAR operations, with electronic capability as well as air-dropable rescue equipment, such as pumps, rafts, medical supplies, and shelter; and the load can be tailored depending on the mission specifications. Each aircraft is crewed, in addition to the pilots, of course, with two SAR techs—search and rescue technicians—who are trained in advance trauma, life support, land and sea survival, and specialized rescue techniques, including Arctic rescue, parachuting, diving, and mountain climbing. They're the full rescue capability.

The next chart I'd like to speak to briefly is of the COSPAS/SARSAT system. The notification of an incident is the key to SAR response. Back in the early eighties, Canada was one of the founding member nations to develop COSPAS/SARSAT. Essentially it's a satellite-based detection system for distress beacons. Since we've used SARSAT and COSPAS, we have substantially reduced search times, because we get very rapid location and information, allowing us to pick the appropriate SAR response.

Quite recently, we've actually improved the capability of the COSPAS/SARSAT system, as we converted to 406 megahertz technology, a digital capability with beacons, which now gives us very precise location and very quick alerting capability, and a number of details about the registration of the aircraft and the number of people involved. It helps us greatly in planning the initial stages of any search operation.

As an example, a twin-engine airplane crashed in Iqaluit in December with two people on board. They were both saved. We got a 406 alert, which triggered the system and gave us vital information that allowed us to do a very prompt and quick search and rescue operation.

The next chart is on MAJAID, or major air response capability. It's for an airline-sized air disaster in a remote area. We have pre-prepared and ready-for-dispatch MAJAID kits that contain shelters, provisions, and medical supplies. They're rigged for immediate dispatch and can be rapidly deployed and aerially delivered to the scene of the crash.

The MAJAID kits themselves are just one component of our major air disaster capability. Initially we would launch our primary aircraft, which have some capability to provide shelter and medical aid to people on the ground. We'd follow with MAJAID kits. We'd deploy a forward medical facility, and then we'd start the medical evacuation. We have a plan to support MAJAID that includes not only the military, but territorial responsibilities and other government agencies. Canada is the only nation with such a capability.

In addition to MAJAID, we have caches of survival equipment throughout the north. They contain clothing and shelters, and can be picked up and dispatched to an incident site as required.

The next two slides list statistics on the number of incidents we have recorded by region for a five-year period. The trend has not changed dramatically over the number of years that we've been tracking this data. These are all types of incidents, from false alerts to actual incidents.

The next one, which is more pertinent to our discussion today, shows incidents that have occurred north of 55 for the last five years. We've recorded incidents from the various rescue coordinating centres. These are categories one and two, which means we actually launched SAR assets on the cases. That doesn't necessarily mean they were distresses, but we had no other choice but to launch. You can see that the numbers are fairly small.

Finally is the chart that illustrates incident distribution. Superimposed on that we have our primary source squadrons and secondary squadrons. I think this chart really illustrates that a preponderance of incidents occur where we are based, and there is no particular part of the north where a large number of incidents take place.

Mr. Chairman, I will conclude my remarks there. I look forward to the discussion.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Maxime Bernier]

Thank you very much, Mr. Drover.

Now I will give the floor to Mr. Bryon Wilfert.

[Bryon Wilfert, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Arctic sovereignty is best if defended with a clear and consistent policy supported by the appropriate resources in order to demonstrate one's national interest and sovereignty.

Mr. Davidson, given the level of Canada's search and rescue program, will it be capable of responding to increasing needs in the coming years? As a volunteer-based organization, if the government came to you for increased assistance, would you be able to provide it?

[John R. Davidson]

It would be a challenge, but we have members currently in Resolute Bay, Cambridge Bay, Baker Lake, Rankin Inlet, and Iqaluit, so it would not take any great effort to extend beyond that into the other communities. It would not be easy, because of the size of the Arctic.

[Bryon Wilfert, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

To both gentlemen, I was disturbed to read in the findings of the Senate Committee on National Security and Defence that only half of our surveillance aircraft and rescue helicopters are able to report for duty. Could you comment on that issue of readiness?

[Col P. Drover]

I can speak to the readiness issue. Our standby posture is maintained 24 hours a day, seven days a week. That does not necessarily mean they're the only aircraft on base. In fact, normally there are backups for those aircraft. The statistics may be misleading, in that the situation doesn't impact on our readiness posture or our level of service delivery. But as in all fleets, maintenance issues pop up from time to time.

[Bryon Wilfert, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Mr. Chairman, in 2006, as part of the strategic mandate of SAR, it was stated in regard to northern SAR, “To review existing services and recommend possible adjustments in the approach to SAR service delivery, given increasing activity in the North”. Has this occurred within the organization?

The working group was supposed to consist of federal, territorial, and municipal actors when it was formed. It was mandated to produce a report on northern SAR strategy. The mandate included a three-year timetable. Can you give this committee a status report on the report? If the report has been concluded, what are the recommendations?

[Col P. Drover]

I'm not in a position to respond directly to that question because I'm not totally familiar with the report you're referring to. I certainly did not participate in any interdepartmental discussions.

I will offer, though, that currently, from what we've seen in terms of activity levels, our posture is optimized to provide the maximum capability to the greatest number of incidents in the whole of Canada.

I am familiar with the report we did in 2005, when we looked at basing for our resources. It was concluded at that time that our basing posture is correct as it stands now. That does not necessarily mean that at some time, if the need increases, we would not revisit that. It's part of our responsibility to provide the proper formula for the basing.

[Bryon Wilfert, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Following up on that, how is SAR dealing with the anticipated increase in traffic throughout the Arctic, and how has the response training and mandate been adjusted?

[Col P. Drover]

Again, I can report that we are aware of some trends in the Arctic that indicate there is going to be more activity both on the ground and in the air. We have not seen, in any of our trend analyses, that this has driven a greater requirement for search and rescue forces.

On another note, in the north we do work with our northern command, with the Rangers, and with CASARA, and we actually do exercises as well in SAR in the north, so I think we're staying attuned to the situation in the north. We are probably well positioned should it be demonstrated that more attention from a SAR perspective is required. Then we would react accordingly.

I also would like to state that it's not the presence of SAR in the north, but the capability in the north, and I think we've demonstrated that we have that capability. The MAJAID is a good example for the airliner scenario. We can respond fairly rapidly to an incident in the north. We are providing SAR coverage.

[Bryon Wilfert, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

On the issue of coordination, one of the recommendations in the Senate report was “...that the Government of Canada consider Goose Bay, Labrador, as a sub-Arctic staging area for the coordination and support of Coast Guard, fisheries, search and rescue, surveillance and other Arctic activities.”

Could either of you gentlemen comment on that?

[Col P. Drover]

We do have a unit in Goose Bay that performs search and rescue duties. The airfield, of course, is available if we need to base out of there for search and rescue operations. There are no immediate plans that I am aware of that would propose to put a SAR unit per se in Goose Bay at this time.

[Bryon Wilfert, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

In terms of the economic maritime shipping activities in the north, obviously Canadian Forces are going to be required to provide more support, particularly in search and rescue. Where could we beef up planes, personnel, surveillance, and so on, in terms of making sure that we have resources for the future, given some of the current trends in foreign activity and foreign pronouncements with regard to the north?

[Col P. Drover]

I am not in a position to comment on the surveillance or the sovereignty issue. Strictly from a search and rescue perspective, as I mentioned a little while ago, we continue to make sure that we have the proper basing to support the requirements, and we have not seen changes that would drive any significant change at this time.

[The Chair, Conservative, Maxime Bernier]

Thank you.

You are up next, Mr. Bachand.

[Claude Bachand, Bloc, Saint-Jean, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank our two witnesses for their presentations.

My first question is directed to Mr. Davidson and concerns the Civil Air Search and Rescue Association of Manitoba, or CASARA Manitoba. I couldn't help but think of the Minuteman Project where volunteers patrol the Mexican-US border with their guns and rifles to maintain law and order.

Mind you, I am not trying to compare CASARA-Manitoba with the Minuteman Project, but what about proper certification? Did you say that National Defence was responsible for the certification process? I would imagine that a person can't simply take their old 1950s airplane out of its hangar and take to the skies to answer a distress call. I would imagine your pilots must be certified. What does the certification process entail? If an old airplane crashes, we have two problems, not just one.

[John R. Davidson]

Thank you, sir.

No. I guarantee you that we will not become the Minuteman of the north for CASARA Manitoba.

In terms of our certification, we have developed our own training programs in conjunction with the national search and rescue manual. That has been approved and vetted through the Department of National Defence. It's the old scenario, where we as the contractor, if you will, will provide the quality control. The CASARA liaison officers will provide the quality assurance. We ensure ourselves that our members are properly trained. We do our own training. We do our own check rides. We do our own internal reviews of our capabilities.

Each and every member must pass a number of requirements. There's a four-hour requirement for academic training for the navigators, a three-hour for the pilot, and a two-hour for the spotters, for instance. Then each one of them must perform the search patterns we have that were taken from the national SAR manual and must be competent in performing those things.

[Claude Bachand, Bloc, Saint-Jean, QC]

Do people supply their own equipment? By equipment, I mostly mean the aircraft. Do they supply their own airplane and do they decide to take to the skies? What guarantee do you have that these aircraft have been properly maintained? Could someone possibly fail to keep his aircraft in proper working order and in the process cause a problem?

[John R. Davidson]

No. It's never been an issue with our members. What we've found is that CASARA has generated such a sense of duty, pride, and respect that our members will not bring an aircraft that is poorly maintained.

Transport Canada has the responsibility to maintain the regulations for private aircraft, but we will not allow uncertified airplanes or poorly maintained and unsafe aircraft. It's too much of a risk for us to do that. We have three other members of our association sitting in that airplane. I'm not prepared to risk their lives on something that is of minor cost to maintain properly.

[Claude Bachand, Bloc, Saint-Jean, QC]

My next question is directed to both of the witnesses.

Mr. Davidson, you seem to be in a preparatory mode of sorts. We hear a great deal these days about the possibility of privatizing search and rescue operations. I'd also like to get Colonel Drover's opinion on this subject, since many people have told me that SAR responsibility should remain in the hands of the military because not only do its members have more training, they are also dedicated to their work. Yet, others have said to me that perhaps it would be a good idea to privatize search and rescue operations. That would create an opportunity for you to secure a federal government contract for the privatization of such operations. I'm interested in hearing your views on the possible privatization of search and rescue operations.

[John R. Davidson]

I can't speak directly to the privatization of the search and rescue services. However, if the privatization did occur, our members are solely and strictly volunteers, so for us to take on a contract and be responsible, the volunteerism would disappear, because we then would have a responsibility to be there 24/7. It would change the whole flavour of the organization.

We would still be able to provide our services to a third party if the services were contracted. That would not be our preference, of course, but right now I would not want to see CASARA undertake contract relationships with the federal government to provide that service. It would destroy the current organization the way it is under volunteerism.

[The Chair, Conservative, Maxime Bernier]

Colonel Drover.