Allan Appel Photo
Sgt. John Wolcheski, Officer John Barbett and their team not only rescued eight bright orange pumpkins from peril Monday. They also hand-carried the pumpkins into New Haven Harbor and carved pretty Halloween designs on them, while staying submerged for from ten to 20 minutes.
The artistic pumpkin rescue, which was staged by the police department’s Underwater Search and Rescue team (USRT) off the Pardee Sea Wall Monday morning, was serious fun.
Wolcheski and Barbett, both six year vets of the team, after one of their practice pumpkin dives.
It was a training session in improving the small motor movements underwater that are often necessary when the officers perform often less festive duties, like entering cold, murky waters to rescue a gun, find and open a car door, photograph and retrieve a drowned body.
Most of the 14-member team was present for the training, which is one of the twice-a-month, 24 annual trainings that the officers engage in, said the unit’s leader, Sgt. Roy Davis.
When Sgt. Sean Maher emerged carrying his pumpkin, he said: “This is more difficult than trying to secure a tow line on a car or finding a weapon and taking notes” of other evidence.
As the divers took turns taking their ten to 20-minute exercises, three and four at a time, Davis and others kept a watchful eye.
Davis said that most New Haveners aren’t aware that the unit exists — it has been around for 20 or so years — or what it does. Its members generally serve as back-up for the homicide, burglary, or other units in the department.
Davis said that the team — whose officers perform regular duties throughout the year — are assembled when there is a need. It doesn’t go into action with fewer than eight officers.
The toughest assignment Wolcheski and his colleagues ever had to face was finding and retrieving the body of a drowned man who had foolishly challenged the tough currents of the Quinnipiac River and paid a terrible price.
Officer Barbett, with 60 pounds of equipment, enters to carve.
The Q River is in fact one of the places where other trainings take place, said Davis. That’s because its fast currents present different kinds of challenges for the officers to learn from.
When Officer Matt Collier, one of the newer members of the team, emerged with his pumpkin Monday, he noted how murky New Haven waters are, especially if they are disturbed.
“A really good exercise, gets us used to working with our hands with low visibility. If you disturb anything from the bottom, you can’t see,” he said.
Davis said that in general, the waters of New England, not only New Haven, offer at best about three feet of visibility. The officers also train in February, when the water is 36 degrees instead of Monday’s 56,.
At Monday’s exercise, Collier and the other officers emerged after their dives short of breath. They tried to warm up their hands that had begun to get numb after about ten minutes.
Not Just Anyone Can Carve A Pumpkin Underwater
Despite those conditions, Officer Steve Manware (pictured), a 12-year veteran of the USRT, emerged with a pumpkin that had a well done octopus design.
That’s because — truth be told, he fessed up — he is an artist and the nephew of a college art professor. Manware was also proud of the logo painted on the side of the unit’s mobile trailer parked on the bright green grass of the park, before which each of the officers placed his pumpkin for review. The logo was Manware’s handiwork.
Manware said that part of the secret to his creating such an intricate design under water is that he placed a rock inside the pumpkin and on top of it, and then he got to work.
Another of the officers said he’d have done a better design if a crab hadn’t been after him and if he’d been able to see anything.
The serious fun was performed by highly trained officers, all of whom must be basic open water SCUBA certified before they apply for the elite squad. Then they have to take additional swimming tests. Collier — who along with officers Christian Bruckhart, Edrick Agosto, and Allyn Wright, has just joined the team — said those tests include swimming laps in a pool with a variety of weights attached and doing various lengths underwater with a single breath.
“If you make the team, then you go to [an additional] class to be rescue certified,” Davis added.
The officers stay in good shape, as swimmers, said Davis (pictured with his new son and pumpkins). There is no cross-training, and these officers do not belong to the SWAT or other specialized and also physically demanding teams in the department.
It’s also not really a job for older men. A recent test, which brought on board the four new officers, was the first offered in five years. Davis estimated that three or four of the older men are getting close to retirement.
Or, as he put it, “When you get older, you don’t want to climb into the freezing water.”
When the squad gets down to 11 members, then another test will be given to bring the team up to its full complement.
Although there was some talk of a formal award to be given to the best submerged pumpkin carved design, no judges were on hand to make the call.
Instead the determination was made that Davis and first-born son Rory, six months old, would take all the pumpkins home with them for a big Halloween party.