When storm clouds gathered in the Texas Hill Country and South Central Texas in July, Texas Game Wardens were at the ready along with other state and local first responders.
As flooding intensified, 28 members of the Texas Game Warden Search and Rescue Team responded and assisted with 157 rescues and 92 evacuations.
The dramatic rescues captured on the news didn’t happen by chance. They were the result of years of planning, specialized training, and strategic investments that have steadily transformed Texas Game Wardens’ search and rescue capabilities.
Major Brent Satsky has watched the evolution firsthand since he first became a member of the Search and Rescue Team more than ten years ago. He responded to the horrific Wimberley floods in 2015 with the limited equipment they had at the time.
“I remember launching the best rescue boat we had available at the time, with no communications equipment, just our life vests and our training,” he recalled. “The noise in a situation like that is hard to convey. We were literally yelling at each other at the top of our lungs, in torrential rain and flooding, calling out obstacles and doing our best in an incredibly chaotic situation.”
Satsky is now the Major over the entire Special Operations Unit, which includes the Search and Rescue Team and other specialty teams. His years with the Search and Rescue Team coincide with the 2017 launch and subsequent growth of Texas Parks and Wildlife Foundation’s (TPWF) S. Reed Morian Gear Up for Game Wardens program. Through generous donations, Gear Up for Game Wardens provides specialty equipment Texas Game Wardens need to maintain safety and ensure the highest level of service for the people of Texas.
Through Gear Up, the Search and Rescue Team has acquired lifesaving specialty equipment including dry suits, communications headsets, drone technology, specialized rescue equipment, and rescue boats built for swiftwater conditions.
“The last ten years have seen an ongoing evolution of training and especially of the equipment,” said Satsky. “Gear Up for Game Wardens has played an important role in that transformation. The beautiful part about Gear Up is you can identify a piece of equipment that you need, and through the generosity of Texans who donate to this program, you can just go get it.”
For Satsky, the equipment is only part of the equation. The game wardens who volunteer for the team bring the skill, judgment, and determination required to use it when conditions are at their worst.
“It’s their skills and mindset that make them good at what they do, and their willingness to put themselves in harm’s way,” said Satsky. “But they need to have this specialized equipment in order to do an incredibly difficult job safely. It makes them more effective, more efficient, and ultimately more successful in saving Texans’ lives.”
That progress was evident during the July floods, when they deployed equipment designed for the conditions they faced, from communications headsets that cut through the roar of rushing water to dry suits and rescue boats built for changing conditions.
And, thanks in part to Gear Up, when an inevitable natural disaster strikes again, Texas Game Wardens will be ready and better equipped to answer the call.
