11 replies to this topic

[mthornton]

Today a snowboarder strayed into a nightmarish terrain-trap... a few years ago he would not have been rescued so easily, if at all.

We are presently experiencing a very warm pulse of coastal air, and the deep snow at lower elevations is rapidly turning into rotten bottomless mashed-potatoes. he fell through the snow into a small creek, and was 100% stuck, and alone.

He whips out his iPhone, and calls 911. The dispatcher puts him through to the RCMP about 20km away, and they phone our patrol dispatch. Soon we have the GPS co-ordinates from his iPhone, and the ground-crew has a google-earth map-pin of exactly where he is, so does the helicopter from a nearby heli-ski operation. The trees are thick, and he's in a steep narrow canyon, but the heli-pilot communicates with the patrollers on the ground, (he can see them all), and in 15 minutes they have him.

A in-area rescue that will never make the news... But this was actually really amazing. Saved by an iPhone.

Attached File(s)

•  cox_cr.jpg (116.57K)
  Number of downloads: 94

This post has been edited by mthornton: 11 March 2012 - 05:52 PM

[Lift Dinosaur]

Unfortunately, the uneducated will soon expect this and complain vocally and visually in Social Media when every area can't protect them from themselves to this level.
Dino

[SkiLiftsRock]

Good Story. At least he had the slightest bit of service out there to get a call out!

[festus-22]

i agree with Dino,

[Skiing#1]

Snowboarder has to pay the bill $$$ for the rescue service and the helicopter. Ouch!

[mthornton]

Nah, Mr. snowboarder didn't do anything wrong. No bill for him.

He was a customer... in bounds, fell in a snow-hole above a creek & got stuck.
A few years ago he would have died and we would have found his remains in the summer, a crow-convention & a bad smell. A summer hiking trail actually passes right by the spot.

Like it or not, the technology is upon us. The customers have iPhones with GPS, (as well as Spot-Trackers) and we have good cell coverage on most of the mountain. An area can choose two routes :

• embrace the extra available information & empower it's patrol & rescue service to do provide maximum location information & communications with a victim
  
• not embrace the technology and work out pre-written media responses as to why they don't do all they can. These will be needed after some kid dies in a snow-hole with a working cell-phone in his hand.

Some areas don't have good cell coverage, fair enough. But those that do, can review their use of simple protocols to take maximum advantage. Simple stuff like making sure patrol dispatch has Google-Earth, and an IP based phone that can receive text-messages from iPhones or Spot-Trackers. In this incident, one of the patrollers had an iPhone, and so quickly had an image of the exact location. The guy was stuck in a creek... he wasn't going to last too long, so the fast response made the difference.

Those using the ski-lifts to access the back-country beyond the ski-hill may expect a bill if they require rescue services, especially if they have done something very stupid. But this is not normally the case. Out-of-bounds shredders are another matter altogether.

[Aussierob]

This happens 50 times a year here, but the people are out of bounds. Sometimes the phone call is used to guide the person back in bounds, other times its used to help in the ir own rescue. Technology is making our job a little easier.

[Lift Dinosaur]

Thanks for the clarification, Mitch. I missed the last sentence in your initial post and assumed this was an out-of-bounds experience.
Technology IS our friend.
Dino

[2milehi]

The helicopter assisting rescue seems extreme - was the snowboarder's life in that grave of a danger?

Other than that great work on the rescue!

This post has been edited by 2milehi: 13 March 2012 - 09:57 AM

[liftmech]

Not sure how things are structured up there, but in central CO Flight for Life will take on the spotter's job with no charge to SAR groups or the victim. It's nice to have an 'eye in the sky' in some situations.

[mthornton]

http://www.rkheliski.com/ Rk Heli-ski has it's base of operations at Panorama, and the heli had just come back from a day of skiing, so all it had to do was fuel-up & go. Distance from the pad to the rescue-site was maybe 2 km.

I'm no expert on hypothermia, but this guy was down a hole & in the water. Who knows how long he would have lasted.

My project now is to find a superior IP-based dispatch console/phone that works well with sms. What are other folks out there using?

[mthornton]

Here is an awesome app for iPhone owners, which quickly sends gps co-ordinates to a pre-defined sms number or an email address
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/gps-to-sms/id392549369?mt=8 for Android people there are similar apps. Very cool!

Today i walked into our IT office and told them which IP phone I wanted in our patrol dispatch, a Cisco 7912G. this can handle in/out sms messages and handle automatic digital voice & sms recording all in a single box the dispatch operator can't fuck up. We have a Northern-Telecom PBX, and I think the tel-system-administrator's head blew up, which I found very funny to watch. (this is why I will never be a senior manager)