Critical Skills for Safety©

By their nature, accidents are unpredictable. The trained facilitator must be comfortable with all angles, competent with rescues and confident in the midst of chaos.

Critical Skills for Safety (CSS) is a transforming technical workshop that leaves a mark of confidence on everyone who completes its objectives. Initially developed to teach technical and rescue skills, CSS quickly evolved into a deeply moving experience.

The crowning event of CSS is the cutaway rescue. With a performance standard of less than four minutes from the ground, the cutaway rescue becomes the embodiment of all the critical skills a facilitator will need to be able to conduct high elements and rescues. Learning to perform this emotional task with a time limit presents the facilitator with the single most important critical skill: the mastery of fear. The moving element in this workshop is a lesson of calm and focus that develops through the sequence of training that leads up to the dynamic event.

This workshop includes:

• Inspection skills for the facilitator
• Low element safety & spotting techniques
• High element belay and self-belay
• High element systems and setup
• Medical screening & physiological response
• Information on how programming and course design creates emergencies
• Developing judgment
• Six concepts for high element rescue
• Four steps in programming to avoid rescues
• Six types of rescues and how to execute each
• Program documentation and record keeping

"I appreciate your enthusiasm and patience when teaching. I also appreciate that you take time to understand each of our learning styles and teach accordingly." —LD

"Really like how safety comes first in any element that is done in the workshop. Great environment to work in."—PM

"How valuable I think this training was! To make yourself take three days for just safety training should be a must. The skill development was awesome and the change in my confidence was profound." — BC