Snowcats to the rescue
April 16, 2012 8:41 PM   Subscribe

"Our goals are to train and maintain a network of highly efficient avalanche search and rescue cat teams across Canada." The Canadian Avalanche Rescue Cat Association seeks to add adorable kitties (CARCA) to the teams of animals that currently play a role in search-and-rescue missions for avalanche survivors. Only a few years old, they're the subject of a soon-to-be-available documentary (trailer), and offer training videos to demonstrate the serious business of training cats for search-and-rescue. And they are definitely not fake, please do not believe that canine propaganda.
posted by Anonymous (30 comments total)
 
ahh the rescue kittehs! Also: eponysterical.
posted by sweetkid at 8:43 PM on April 16, 2012 [3 favorites]


So cute!

And yet...I envisage a pack of rescue kittehs nomming on the exposed leg of a half-buried skier.
posted by darkstar at 8:52 PM on April 16, 2012 [6 favorites]


Specially trained cats? The CIA tried this once. The cost to train the animal was emmense. Despite the whole 9-lives thing it was a short lived project...
posted by Nanukthedog at 8:54 PM on April 16, 2012


the immediate imagery this post inspired is that of a cat, softly mewing on a cold, mountain night as I lay, entombed in snow mere meters below. meanwhile, half a mile away my friend is being pulled to safety while a dog happily leaps around barking at the miracle it has induced.
posted by IvoShandor at 8:57 PM on April 16, 2012 [10 favorites]


Despite the whole 9-lives thing it was a short lived project...

Only a dog could say something like that.
posted by travelwithcats at 9:21 PM on April 16, 2012 [2 favorites]


"What's that Garfield? Timmy fell down a well? Oh, you shoved Timmy down a well...?"
posted by oneswellfoop at 9:43 PM on April 16, 2012 [7 favorites]


Perhaps next, cats can be trained to guide the visually impaired.
posted by aeschenkarnos at 9:48 PM on April 16, 2012




Well sure they will...because they are in league with Death himself!

(Or is that Satan?)

j/k kittehs! Don't eat me!


*d'awww*
posted by darkstar at 10:15 PM on April 16, 2012


oh my.
posted by LobsterMitten at 10:30 PM on April 16, 2012


So this is real.
posted by huckleberryhart at 11:00 PM on April 16, 2012


Could be trouble when the avalanche cats meet the avalanche poodle.
posted by jade east at 11:04 PM on April 16, 2012 [1 favorite]


Alright, time to get myself caught in an avalanche just so I can get rescued by them.
posted by Apocryphon at 11:20 PM on April 16, 2012 [1 favorite]


Perhaps next, cats can be trained to guide the visually impaired

I want to name my next band Seeing Eye Cats.
posted by XhaustedProphet at 11:41 PM on April 16, 2012 [2 favorites]


I like Tucker, he looks like a Kitler Charlie Chaplin.
posted by jabberjaw at 1:01 AM on April 17, 2012 [1 favorite]


I have no idea how these people got their cats wedged in avalanches or why.
posted by Violet Hour at 2:01 AM on April 17, 2012 [2 favorites]


The cats didn't get themselves wedged, their victims rescued people did.
posted by arcticseal at 3:26 AM on April 17, 2012


Ah. This explains the Q1 uptick in catnip essential oil sales.
posted by likeso at 4:07 AM on April 17, 2012


Saw the short a year ago at the Banff Mountain Film Festival. It was unquestionably the (comedic) hit of the night. Wish that were available online somewhere. Really silly and fun.
posted by msbrauer at 5:19 AM on April 17, 2012


To be honest my interest in this evaporated once I found out the whole CARCA site was a gimmick to sell a mockumentary. I kind of hoped for a minute it might actually be real, because wouldn't that be cool... but no. It's to sell DVDs.

Oh yeah, and the CBC compared CARCA "founder" Steve Ruskay to Sascha Baron Cohen.

Bleh.
posted by suburbanbeatnik at 6:12 AM on April 17, 2012


Go girl! Go get help!
posted by Naberius at 6:50 AM on April 17, 2012


I kind of hoped for a minute it might actually be real, because wouldn't that be cool... but no. It's to sell DVDs.

Hence the trailer...
posted by desjardins at 7:03 AM on April 17, 2012


The fact that it is not real is very much with the sad-making for me this morning...
posted by Kitteh at 7:07 AM on April 17, 2012 [1 favorite]


I am simply crushed that this is not real--i forwarded the link to many friends who are cat lovers. What will I tell them now. And I am a dog person. Not the way I want to start a day--hope, amazement, soaring expectations. gob smacked and then he seeds of doubt followed by spiraling disappointment.
posted by rmhsinc at 8:10 AM on April 17, 2012


Mrs A totally bought this. She already thinks our cat is brighter than many small children, so why not rescue cats?

Damn you Internet for not being true.
posted by arcticseal at 8:23 AM on April 17, 2012 [1 favorite]


Siberian temple cats win sled race.
posted by hortense at 9:53 AM on April 17, 2012


The fact that it is not real is very much with the sad-making for me this morning...

UH-OH! SUMONE DON'T HAZ KITTEH SPELCHEK!
posted by y2karl at 10:03 AM on April 17, 2012


I think the internet has broken my brain, because it took me several minutes to figure out this isn't real.

If it were then I would totally have my cats apply. They have extra toes that would be great for digging through snow!
posted by apricot at 10:11 AM on April 17, 2012 [1 favorite]


Intelligence and ability don't correlate to willingness.
posted by desjardins at 11:19 AM on April 17, 2012


I was hoping that at the end of the training videos link, there would be a guy in the snowbank right next to where Quenta was playing who would stand up suddenly and go "Hurray, Quenta, you found me!" in a magnanimous voice.

The cat, of course, would be completely oblivious.
posted by chrominance at 6:27 PM on April 17, 2012


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