My name is Jerry Kiffer. I am the Fire Chief for the North Tongass Fire Department and President of the Ketchikan Volunteer Rescue Squad. We are a one hundred percent volunteer organization that provides wilderness search and rescue, high-angle and marine rescues, and support for the Alaska State Troopers and Coast Guard. When someone is lost or in trouble, there is not anyone else coming, so we go.
I first got involved with the rescue squad through the Boy Scouts back in the 1970s. Our scout leaders were part of KVRS, and helping others just became part of who I was. Growing up in Ketchikan, if you saw a cabin door open on the beach, your responsibility was to stop and close it. You didn’t think about it. You just did it. That same sense of responsibility is what drives me today.
The work can look dangerous from the outside, but it is not about risk taking. We train carefully and move slowly. Calm is our greatest tool. We hang below helicopters, rappel off cliffs, and search through rough weather, but we do it in the safest way possible. I like a job that is done simply, without drama, without fanfare. The best mission is the one nobody ever hears about.
Volunteering here is not a hobby. It is a lifestyle. People get up at three in the morning, leave their families, and go into the rain and cold because someone needs help. We do not get paid and we do not expect recognition. The reward is in knowing that when someone’s loved one is missing, there are people willing to go find them.
I believe in stewardship. This organization belongs to the community, not to me. When I eventually retire, there will be someone else in the chair, but the mission will stay the same. We get up, we go out, and we help. That is what it means to live here.
I first got involved with the rescue squad through the Boy Scouts back in the 1970s. Our scout leaders were part of KVRS, and helping others just became part of who I was. Growing up in Ketchikan, if you saw a cabin door open on the beach, your responsibility was to stop and close it. You didn’t think about it. You just did it. That same sense of responsibility is what drives me today.
The work can look dangerous from the outside, but it is not about risk taking. We train carefully and move slowly. Calm is our greatest tool. We hang below helicopters, rappel off cliffs, and search through rough weather, but we do it in the safest way possible. I like a job that is done simply, without drama, without fanfare. The best mission is the one nobody ever hears about.
Volunteering here is not a hobby. It is a lifestyle. People get up at three in the morning, leave their families, and go into the rain and cold because someone needs help. We do not get paid and we do not expect recognition. The reward is in knowing that when someone’s loved one is missing, there are people willing to go find them.
I believe in stewardship. This organization belongs to the community, not to me. When I eventually retire, there will be someone else in the chair, but the mission will stay the same. We get up, we go out, and we help. That is what it means to live here.