10/16/22

by | Mar 17, 2023




Mission: paraglider crashed after taking off from top of Church Mountain. Was with two other parties – another paraglider and a trail-runner who was going to provide transport afterwards. First paraglider takes off and is fine. Second takes off and immediately goes down. 3rd party goes down to check on him – subject is unconscious & initially experiencing agonal breathing, then stops breathing altogether. Two other parties come across and help to call 911. Deputy Mason Stafford calls Justin to discuss a plan. Plan A is for him and I to fly up with border patrol, retrieve body and come right back. Plan B is for him and I to fly up, and if not enough room/power to transport all of us, then we’ll hike back down. Plan C is for ground team (Chris acted as in-town OL and issued standby).
Final execution was a form of plan B. We flew in, was able to land but with borderline power levels, find and package the patient (just off the summit and above trail by 100′), and drag back to heli. I hiked down with partner and 2 RPs, and got a ride back to town.
Lessons: a) darn glad I brought extra webbing – very useful for dragging patient on trail. b) I had started tracking on SARtopo which made it slightly convenient for others to see live updates until cell coverage stopped. c) in-reach was convenient for communicating with ITOL. And d) very useful to come up with contingency plans like we did.