On Sunday, June 24th, 2018, the pilot, National Park Service (NPS) helitack crew and climbing rangers, attached to the Mount Rainier National Park-based rescue helicopter successfully completed a rescue in each of the three large national parks in Washington State in a single day.
At 9 a.m., a call came into the North Cascades National Park Communication Center reporting a backpacker with respiratory distress in the northwest section of the park wilderness. Working with the North Cascades National Park climbing rangers the crew evacuated him to Marblemount from where he was transported to the hospital.
The pilot and crew then responded to Olympic National Park to perform a medical evacuation in the late afternoon of a visitor who had gotten lost after going out for a day hike on Tuesday.
During the evening helicopter flight back home to Mount Rainier National Park, an emergency beacon activation from injured climbers on Mount Rainier's Liberty Ridge was received. Incident staff briefed the crew while in flight. The crew made a slight shift in its course to perform a reconnaissance at about 9,500 feet on the steep ridge where the climbers waited for rescue. An additional Mount Rainier climbing ranger was picked up to help perform the evacuation of the injured climbers. Just before 9 p.m., the ship landed back at its home base, with the injured climbers.
Mount Rainier began its helitack program in 2015 when it initiated a 120-day annual exclusive use contract for an Airbus AS350 B3 helicopter to allow Mount Rainier climbing rangers to perform short-haul helicopter rescue operations. Mount Rainier, North Cascades, and Olympic national parks now share a dedicated short-haul rescue helicopter on contract for the summer season. This coverage is in addition to the National Park Service’s long-lived relationship with the U.S. Army Reserve, Navy, Coast Guard, and Air Force which also perform helicopter rescues in the parks and served as contingency resources during the recent rescues.
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