Life Flight celebrates 5 years, 101 rescues

Steve Petty still takes a little ribbing from his colleagues on the Davis County Sheriff's Search and Rescue Team about the day in 2003 when the Life Flight helicopter had to hoist him off a mountain in Utah County where he'd fallen and dislocated his shoulder during an adventure race.

He doesn't really mind, he says. "I was in a real pickle, so I endure some teasing because of it." Mostly, he says, he's grateful. "I was sure glad to see them."

This week, Intermountain Healthcare's Life Flight medical air transport service reached a milestone: It performed its 101st hoist rescue. The program, the only civilian program in the country certified by the Federal Aviation Administration to perform hoist rescues, has not only helped folks who were injured or stranded but potentially has saved rescuers who would have had to do it all the hard way from greater risks to themselves, as well.

Thursday, program supporters, including law enforcement officials, search and rescue teams, the formerly stranded and others gathered on the helipad at LDS Hospital to celebrate five years of hoist rescues.

"We've used it numerous times," says Sgt. Tom Hodgson, who heads search and rescue for the Utah County Sheriff's Department. "Availability of the hoist has really hastened the things we're able to do — especially advanced life support."

He sees multiple "blessings" to patients and those who hope to rescue them, he says. Even from a manpower standpoint the hoist has huge impact.

For Doug Bassett, the hoist meant nothing less than survival. He was on a hunting trip in a Cache County canyon in 2002 when he missed his step and fell off a cliff. But he only fell partway down, so teams that went looking for him couldn't find him, although they searched for a day and a half.

The frustrated searchers called in Life Flight and the team spotted him in less than eight minutes, he says. "I didn't fall to the bottom where you hunt for people. I was two-thirds of the way down on a shelf."

He was also grievously injured, with a brain injury from an inch-deep head fracture, a leg that doctors wanted to amputate, near kidney failure and a body temperature that was way too low. By the time the air crew came looking for him, his chance of survival was dwindling; the rapid response changed his outcome.

Four years later, he's battled most of the way back, he says.

It's changed the very process of some rescues, says Tooele County Sheriff Frank Park. "Before the hoist, we always had to get to the patient, stabilize him, call in an air ambulance and then we usually had to move the patient — sometimes quite a ways — to get the bird down to pick up. With the hoist, we can go directly with the GPS reading of exactly where the patient is and can pull him right out and save time and lives. And in emergency medicine, time is lives."

He also marvels at the manpower hours of search and rescue crews that are saved in a county that covers 7,000 square miles, he says, when teams have the help of a hoist rescue.

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E-mail: lois@desnews.com