Tom LaDuke, a member of Search and Rescue of the Northern Adirondacks, low-fives his fellow SARNAK members on Wednesday after completing his pack test. (Enterprise photo — Lauren Yates)

SARANAC LAKE — A spring rain washed over Elena Lumby on Wednesday as she trudged down Saranac Lake’s River Street with a tire strapped to her back.

Lumby is the training coordinator for the Search and Rescue of the Northern Adirondacks, or SARNAK — a group of volunteers that aids forest rangers with the state Department of Environmental Conservation, as well as other state law enforcement groups, in wilderness rescues, recoveries and search missions across the Adirondacks and beyond. On Wednesday evening, Lumby and 14 other SARNAK members walked for miles with heavy loads on their backs, completing a required “pack test” that gauges members’ strength and ability to aid with wilderness missions in all terrains.

As Lumby — the last SARNAK member to complete the pack test on Wednesday — neared the finish line at Riverside Park, her fellow members gathered to greet her with high fives and friendly slaps on the back.

“Finish strong, Elena!” yelled Jeff Berry, SARNAK’s coordinator.

Berry said SARNAK’s membership is blooming with new people right now. He estimated that SARNAK has around 30 members. Wednesday’s energetic group was proof — for seven out of the 15 people participating in the pack test, Wednesday was their first day with SARNAK.

The group’s current success is especially remarkable for Berry because, as recently as 2020, SARNAK’s members were considering dissolving the team.

The coronavirus pandemic was hard on SARNAK. Justin Levine, a former Enterprise reporter and former SARNAK member who volunteered with the group for seven years, was coordinator of the group in March 2020. When pandemic-related restrictions on travel kicked in across the state, Levine said SARNAK wasn’t called out for searches as often, and regular training sessions “basically dropped off.”

“That was largely because we didn’t know what was safe at the time,” Levine said.

Berry said two members of SARNAK — Jim Burdick and John Gagnon — held a meeting at the Saranac Lake Free Library in 2020 and told their fellow members that they weren’t sure if the dwindling group could continue. But members at the meeting urged Burdick and Gagnon to keep SARNAK going.

“If it weren’t for them, the team would’ve died,” Berry said of Burdick and Gagnon.

Keeping groups like SARNAK alive is crucial, according to Levine — forest rangers perform a vital service in the Adirondack Park, he said, but he believes they’re “strapped” in terms of the number of staff.

“The fact of the matter is that the number of forest rangers is too low for the amount of state land that needs to be patrolled,” Levine said. “Volunteer groups can help fill in those gaps until the amount of forest rangers is compatible (with the amount of state land they patrol).”

Local organizations and green groups have called on the DEC for years to increase the number of forest rangers serving the Adirondack Park’s 6.1 million acres. This past December, the DEC graduated 38 new forest rangers, and nearly 60% of those graduates — or 22 new rangers — were assigned to work in the Adirondacks, according to DEC spokesperson Jeff Wernick. There’s now a total of 80 forest rangers, including captains and lieutenants, serving in Adirondack counties.

SARNAK formed in 1994. In 1997, SARNAK was accepted into the New York State Federation of Search and Rescue Teams, or NYSFSRT. When state agencies need SARNAK’s help in a mission, they call the NYSFSRT — or they call Berry directly.

Other NYSFSRT-certified search and rescue nonprofits in the Adirondacks include Clifton Park-based Adirondack Mountain Rescue, the Lower Adirondack Search and Rescue Team based in Ballston Spa, and the Inlet-based Central Adirondack SAR Team.

SARNAK is based in Saranac Lake and mostly responds to calls in the Adirondacks. Most recently in the Tri-Lakes, the group helped in the search for 32-year-old Jordan Beaulieu, a Tupper Lake man who went missing in the woods this past October. Beaulieu’s body was found in the woods near Coreys Road a few weeks later.

But the group also helps with missions outside the Adirondacks — they recently traveled to Monticello to help law enforcement search for a missing man. The search is still ongoing, though SARNAK is no longer part of it.

In 2022, SARNAK assisted with one search, one recovery and four carryouts, according to Berry.

SARNAK meets a few times a month for training, board meetings and socials, and they train for rescues year-round. SARANAK can be called to respond to a mission at any time of the day or in the middle of the night, so Berry said they rarely cancel a training session for “crappy” weather like the rain during Wednesday’s pack test. Snow and rain help the team to prepare for real-life missions.