# Backcountry Tactics and Tracking Training Program

> How do police find a suspect who has fled into the backcountry, or a missing child in wind and rain? Two instructors describe a one-week U.S. federal course that teaches officers to read footprints and stride, work out how many people fled a scene, and follow a trail as a protected team, by day and at night. “You will never look at the ground the same after this class.”

Summary by Kersey Lawrence, Original Wisdom. Updated 9 November 2026. Page: https://www.originalwisdom.com/tracking-literature/2013-brewer-hoekwater-backcountry-tactics-tracking-training/

## Citation and access

- **Authors:** Dave Brewer and Wes Hoekwater
- **Year published:** 2013
- **Journal or source:** FLETC Journal (Federal Law Enforcement Training Centers)
- **Full citation:** Brewer, D. and Hoekwater, W. 2013. Backcountry Tactics and Tracking Training Program. FLETC Journal 11(1) (Summer 2013): 34–38. Federal Law Enforcement Training Centers, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Glynco, Georgia.
- **Access status:** Hosted: U.S. government work, not subject to copyright in the United States
- **PDF:** https://www.originalwisdom.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/11/2013_Brewer_and_Hoekwater_backcountry-tactics-and-tracking-training-program.pdf

## Tags

- **Species:** Humans
- **Region:** North America > United States
- **Tracking:** Gaits; Track measurements; Tracking; Tracks; Tracks and signs identification; Trailing
- **Methods and technology:** Global Positioning System (GPS)
- **Data type:** Protocol or guidelines
- **Observer qualification:** Reported but not validated
- **Discipline:** Awareness; Human tracking; Orienteering and navigation
- **Year published:** 2013

## Detailed keywords

- **Species:** Studied: humans (law enforcement officers and agents trained as trackers, and the suspects and missing people they track). No animals studied; game and fish violations are mentioned as one use of tracking.
- **Location and habitat:** United States. The course is usually run on one of two ranches in New Mexico, and has also been taught in Utah, West Virginia, California, Mississippi and South Carolina, through the Federal Law Enforcement Training Centers (FLETC) sites at Artesia, New Mexico, and Glynco, Georgia. Rural backcountry; the case examples include Mount Rainier National Park, Washington State, near Fort Bragg in California, New York State, the grounds of an international airport, a 1,000-acre sagebrush field in Utah, and a rural area “in the South”.
- **Topics:** human tracking for law enforcement (tactical tracking); fugitive and suspect apprehension in rural areas; search and rescue of a lost or abducted child; marijuana grow sites; crime scene investigation; footprint and stride documentation; tracking card and tracking box exercise; micro-tracking; telling how many people fled a scene (“one plus one” theory); people walking in the same track; counter-tracking; tracking team formation (tracker, controller, flankers, rear cover); night tracking with coloured lights; land navigation and compass as backup to GPS; camouflage and concealment; officer safety; tracking as a perishable skill.
- **Statistics or models:** None
- **Data type:** Description of a training program, with anecdotal case examples. No dates of data collection; the program began in 2005. Published in a U.S. government agency magazine (not peer reviewed). The PDF is the whole 48-page Summer 2013 issue; the tracking article is on pages 34 to 38 and the author notes on page 5.

## Synopsis

### 1. What they did

Two instructors at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Centers (FLETC), part of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, describe the Backcountry Tactics and Tracking Training Program (BTTTP). They argue that recent high-profile cases, in which police had to track murder suspects into rural country, show that law enforcement needs trained trackers and tracking teams. Most tactical teams are used to working in towns and are less confident and less skilled in rural areas.

FLETC started the program in 2005. It is a one-week course covering:

- Land navigation and Global Positioning System (GPS)

- Tracking

- Principles of camouflage

- Crime scene investigation

- Tactical team movement

Teaching is scenario based. The course began at FLETC’s Artesia, New Mexico, site and is usually held on one of two ranches in New Mexico. Because agencies in the eastern United States asked for training in terrain like their own, it is now also offered through FLETC’s Glynco, Georgia, site, with the same curriculum and instructors from both sites. It has also been taught in Utah, West Virginia, California, Mississippi and South Carolina. The authors illustrate the skills with examples from real cases.

### 2. What they found

The article reports no study results. It describes what the course teaches and gives examples of tracking in police work:

- Reading a crime scene: students document tracks, including measurements of the imprint and of stride or gait, on a tracking card. This helps confirm sign during a track, can be used as evidence, and stride measurements can be used for “micro-tracking” to find the next sign. In one example, a normal stride to and from a homicide scene suggests the suspect walked there and away with no fear of being seen.

- Contaminated scenes: a tracker can eliminate the first responders’ footprints and isolate the one track not linked to them, which would be the suspect’s.

- Footwear evidence: using the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) footprint database, a footprint can be matched to a suspect’s footwear by its wear pattern. Footprints can also show how fast someone left the scene.

- Marijuana grow sites: trackers can follow a person from a parked vehicle carrying fertiliser and plastic pipe to the grow site, as in one case on the grounds of an international airport.

- Team tracking: the tracker is protected by a team. A controller directly behind them sets the speed and movement, flankers clear threats ahead and pick up any tracks that branch off, and a rear cover guards against counter-tracking. Students learn the “one plus one” theory: if the team thinks it is following one suspect, what happens when a second person joins? Sometimes suspects walk in the same track, and an experienced tracker looks for this.

- How many people fled: a deputy chased what he thought was one suspect, met two, and was shot in the head. The course trains officers to tell how many people actually left a scene, and stresses how dangerous it is for an officer to run after a suspect who has bailed out of a car after a pursuit, unless several officers cover them.

- A missing child: the authors note that night tracking, although risky, may be needed when looking for an abducted or lost child. A Utah police sergeant, who also teaches on the course, found the footprint of a missing or abducted 11-year-old girl (autistic and partially blind) in a puddle in front of her house and, with a team, tracked her for an hour and a half into about 1,000 acres of sagebrush in rain and blowing wind. She was found hiding in a sagebrush, cold and suffering from exposure, and made a full recovery.

- Night tracking: students try red, blue or subdued yellow lights, depending on what their eyes accept, and sometimes infrared with night vision. A light held on the end of a stick avoids a glow around the tracker’s body that would make them a target.

- Navigation: GPS does not always work, so students learn compass navigation to fix exact locations for air evacuation, evidence and the start point of a track.

### 3. What they concluded

- Tracking is “a mindset, a way of life”, and a skill that fades if it is not used regularly.

- Agencies working in rural areas need trained trackers or tracking teams to investigate and safely apprehend suspects, and the same tactics carry over to search and recovery.

- Students are told on the first day that they “will never look at the ground the same after this class.”

### 4. How tracking was or was not used

The whole article is about tracking people. Students learn to identify and tell apart different tracks, document footprints, imprint measurements and stride, and follow a trail as part of a protected team, by day and at night. The case examples include trailing suspects and a missing child, and isolating a suspect’s footprints at a crime scene.

### 5. Tracker or observer certification

Reported but not validated. No certification or test of the instructors’ or students’ tracking skill is described. The first author is described as the program’s team leader since its start and a senior instructor, with 21 years in criminal investigations and special operations units in Florida and Arkansas before joining FLETC. The second author is a branch chief in FLETC’s Operational Skills Branch and a former Georgia Department of Natural Resources conservation ranger. The article refers to “the experienced tracker” without saying how experience is measured.

### 6. Other technologies, skills or innovations

- Tracking card and “tracking box” exercise to record imprint and stride measurements

- FBI footprint database for matching footwear wear patterns

- GPS, with compass land navigation as a backup

- Coloured lights (red, blue, subdued yellow), infrared lights with night vision, and a light on a stick for night tracking

- Changing the angle of light to show a track more clearly

- Hand signals (“ON TRACK”), team formations and cover-to-cover movement; plotting the team’s location and the Point Last Seen (PLS) for Incident Command

- Camouflage and concealment for intelligence gathering

### 8. Implications for tracking (Original Wisdom's observations)

_These are Original Wisdom's observations, not the authors'._

- The article shows tracks and signs identification and trailing applied to people: separating one person’s footprints from many, reading speed and intent from stride, and counting how many people are on a trail. These are the same skills wildlife trackers use, applied with officer safety in mind.

- It calls tracking a perishable skill but describes no test of trackers’ skill, so readers cannot tell how reliable trackers trained on the one-week course are.

## Cite this summary

Lawrence, K. 2026. Summary of: Backcountry Tactics and Tracking Training Program (Brewer and Hoekwater, 2013). Original Wisdom, Tracking Literature. https://www.originalwisdom.com/tracking-literature/2013-brewer-hoekwater-backcountry-tactics-tracking-training/