The International Rescue Instructors Authority was established in 1984 under the specter of the same issue confronting rescue instructors today: vicarious liability.

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History

When the Swiftwater Rescue Technician program was first started in California in 1979, the first government body to formally acknowledge the class was the California State Fire Marshal’s office. It issued a “certificate of completion” for swiftwater and flood rescue under its “F-Step” program, so that firefighters could get credit for attendance and re-imbursement. The California Peace Officers Standards and Training system quickly followed for the same reasons. However, neither organization “certified” the validity of the instructor, nor do they or similar organizations do so today.

In 1980 the United States Lifesaving Association approached the founder of Rescue 3, Jim Segerstrom, with the idea of providing third-party certification for the SRT program in exchange for his involvement in their organization. The result was the founding of the Redwood Coast Chapter of the USLA, unique among chapters in that it included only a few lifeguards in the membership, with a majority of search & rescue and fire personnel members who had attended various water rescue programs, including surf, swiftwater, rope and helicopter rescue.

That same year the USLA received a grant from the Levi Straus Company to start working on the creation of a national system of regionalized technical rescue teams prepared to respond to major flooding incidents. Thus the American Lifesaving Emergency Response Teams were formed, with Rescue 3 providing the instructional cadre and the USLA certifying the programs.

This arrangement continued until 1984. In 1983 the Royal Lifesaving Society of Canada, and the members of its board who were in authority in 1982, were jointly sued by a family for damages caused to their daughter, who was paralyzed after diving into a shallow pool during a lifesaving training program in Saskatoon. The ensuing settlement un-nerved the sitting board of the USLA, all of whose members immediately “homesteaded” their houses, and dropped all certification programs other than those for professional surf lifeguards.

With no other organization available, instructors from several rescue training organizations in the US and Canada met at Lake Tahoe in August of 1984. The three day meeting resulted in the founding of the Rescue Instructors Association, and the writing of the “Philosophy of Rescue Instruction,” a preamble to which they all agreed provided a base level for education, instructional delivery, and certification, regardless of discipline or country. That “philosophy” has largely been adopted by organizations around the world as a “standard” since then.

In 1985 member instructors joined from Australia and England, and the organization’s name was changed to the International Rescue Instructors Association, domiciled in the company offices of Rescue 3 until 1990, and in those of the successor company Rescue 3 International until 2000.

A stand-alone Advisory Board was brought into being in 1992 to provide oversight on instructional standards, discipline, methodologies, and certification issues. In 1998 the current controlling management of Rescue 3 announced that they were no longer going to support an independent certification system, relying instead on compliance with the NFPA 1670 standard.

In 2000 the founders of Rescue 3, Jim Segerstrom, and Rescue Canada, Jim Lavalley, chose to continue supporting independent audit procedures and certification standards over “compliance,” due to the continued and proven vicarious liability exposures of the latter process. Along with a number of like-minded instructors from organizations in six countries, they relocated the International Rescue Instructors Authority to British Columbia as a not-for-profit charitable association.

Today, the IRIA continues to grow, as organizations around the world face the growing exposure and hazards of a variety of legal “short-cuts” to accomplish rescue training, including “train-the-trainer,” in-house programs, programs by committee, and “self-certification.”

Members of the IRIA realize we live in litigious world, one in which taxpayers have every expectation that advertised rescue services will be delivered in a timely and competent manner as advertised.

When expectations and realities differ, the International Rescue Instructors Authority stands prepared to protect its programs, members and clients.