E97 The Big Sur Rescue

[00:00:11] Speaker A: Dude, I am sitting here trying to prep for this episode, and you just hit the launch button. Launching now. Let me paint the picture, man, for the listeners right now. [00:00:25] Speaker B: Let's hear it. [00:00:26] Speaker A: We just rolled up here. I'm setting up. You came in all sweaty. You're still probably out of breath from running around the unit, man. [00:00:32] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:00:32] Speaker A: Time for another star story, brother. [00:00:34] Speaker B: I drank way too much coffee today. [00:00:36] Speaker A: I did. [00:00:37] Speaker B: And I'm worried because I have a night flight, and it's only. It's 02:00 p.m. dude, I was talking. [00:00:41] Speaker A: To my brother this morning after I drank, like, three cups of coffee. Cause I was waiting for the Home Depot guy to come over and measure it. [00:00:48] Speaker B: No kidding, bud. The Home Depot guy. [00:00:50] Speaker A: I drank too much coffee, and I was nervous for the Home Depot guy. I was jittery. [00:00:54] Speaker B: Yeah. You're like, what do I say to him? Do I shake his hand? Do I. [00:00:57] Speaker C: Nothing. [00:00:57] Speaker A: I still feel like I'm coming down from that. [00:00:59] Speaker B: Okay, well, we're in the same boat, so we both got the jitters. [00:01:02] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:01:02] Speaker B: Not a good thing. I'm pretty sure I got, like, a heart rate alert. I was leaving my house because I was like, oh, crap, I gotta go, uh, for the podcast. [00:01:10] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:01:10] Speaker B: You know, um, got to make it on time. And I was loading up some stuff in the. In the car before I came over. And I looked at my heart rate, and I was like, good lord, dude. I worked out this morning. I was relaxed most of the day. [00:01:21] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:01:22] Speaker B: And then it was like, go time. [00:01:23] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:01:23] Speaker B: I don't know what's. What's up? So, anyways, super amped search and rescues. [00:01:26] Speaker A: What's up? [00:01:27] Speaker B: I feel like the star alarm just went off. Startled. [00:01:30] Speaker A: Let's go. [00:01:30] Speaker B: My heart rate doesn't know what to do. [00:01:32] Speaker A: Sweet. [00:01:33] Speaker B: Um, yeah, man. Sorry to, uh. Sorry to just hit the record button. No. But, uh, what I found is we. We talk a lot about, uh, we talk about all the good stuff on the front end, and then we press the record button. Yeah, let's just send it. I know, dude. [00:01:47] Speaker A: This is. This is. We're beta testing this. [00:01:50] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:01:50] Speaker A: And I'll probably do it from here on out. Yeah, sweet. [00:01:52] Speaker B: Beta testing for the new alpha alpha test. Test. I don't know. Yeah, whatever. [00:01:57] Speaker A: Happy Friday. [00:01:58] Speaker B: Yeah, happy Friday to you. Man. It is hot. [00:02:00] Speaker A: It is hot here, but there's toasty out. There was a moment this morning when a breeze rolled through, and I was like, I feel it. It is gonna cool down. [00:02:07] Speaker B: It was weird. [00:02:08] Speaker A: It was nice. [00:02:10] Speaker B: I don't know, I feel I feel like an old man sometimes. I'm like, ooh, cool breeze coming from the north. [00:02:16] Speaker A: It's happening. [00:02:17] Speaker B: It's happening. Falls coming. [00:02:18] Speaker A: The flannels and ipas are coming out. [00:02:20] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, dude, I've got, like, you know, and I know it's way too early, and it's probably attributed to the absolute lack of rain, but the oak leaves, I have a lot of oak trees, and they're starting to fall. And I'm like, what's going on here? It's not really fall, but things are changing. [00:02:35] Speaker A: My dude, it's time to get that rake out. [00:02:37] Speaker B: Gosh, dude, I can feel the flannel morphing onto my upper body right now. My facial hair is growing. [00:02:45] Speaker A: Fall man. There's Florida man, but there's also a fall man. [00:02:48] Speaker B: Gosh, man, I want to sit outside. I want to have a fire. [00:02:51] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:02:52] Speaker B: A couple crispy boys. [00:02:53] Speaker A: Yeah. And then a couple more. [00:02:54] Speaker B: And then a couple more. Cigar. [00:02:57] Speaker A: Yeah, dude. All of it. [00:02:59] Speaker B: Yeah. I can't wait. Anyways, it is September. Yeah. By the time this is released, it is September. Current date is August. [00:03:08] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:03:08] Speaker B: August is the hottest month in the south. I'm pretty convinced that's probably the second hot. September's hot. You know, it's still hurricanes season. Still a little scary there, but we're getting through it. We're getting through a lot of stuff right now. [00:03:20] Speaker A: We are. [00:03:22] Speaker B: You want to talk about what's going on, ATC? [00:03:24] Speaker A: Yeah. I feel like there's needs to be, like a disco song playing because we're going to mention the film party. [00:03:30] Speaker B: Yeah, there was a phone party. [00:03:32] Speaker A: There was. [00:03:32] Speaker B: If you're not familiar with the phone party. I don't know, Google ATC mobile phone party. [00:03:38] Speaker A: Yep. [00:03:38] Speaker B: And I'm pretty sure the local news covered it. [00:03:40] Speaker A: Yep. Hanger two, the CAsa and the 60 hanger had an inadvertent activation of the foam fire retardant system, which was not AFFF, which I didn't know there was multiple different fire retardant foams, but, yeah. Um, anyways, it filled the whole hangar up, brother. [00:03:57] Speaker B: It was spewing out. [00:03:59] Speaker A: That is the. The hangers mass. And then. [00:04:01] Speaker B: And then it went another 100, 200 yards beyond the hanger. Yeah, it looked like, you know, you know those little contraptions you used to be able to smush a bunch of play doh in and then throw the lever down and it just kind of, like, poops out. [00:04:13] Speaker A: This oozes out. You make spaghetti. [00:04:14] Speaker B: That's what it looked like coming out of the hangar. Yeah, that was wild. [00:04:17] Speaker A: Dude, I, um. That. When somebody sent me that picture, at first, I was like, there's. I was like, first of all, I was like, that's gonna be an interesting week. Second of all, is like, there is. If there was a fire in that hanger, there's no chance of it surviving. Oh, no, it is. [00:04:29] Speaker B: It did its job 100%. There is no fire. [00:04:33] Speaker A: That's wild. And then, like, walking around in our hangar after that, I'm kind of, like, looking up at the ceiling, and I'm just thinking of that as so much foam. [00:04:40] Speaker B: That's a lot of foam, dude. [00:04:42] Speaker A: That's crazy. [00:04:42] Speaker B: Um, yeah, the. The mind could not comprehend for a. [00:04:45] Speaker A: Minute there, dude, huge shout out, um, to the hanger deck over there. Mandy. [00:04:51] Speaker B: There's. [00:04:51] Speaker A: They had three up sixties by the end of the week, however many up casas. But turning and burning, and it was not a cool weather week. [00:04:59] Speaker B: No. [00:05:00] Speaker A: And they were outside doing the work, and it was very impressive, dude. [00:05:05] Speaker B: That is the only way that we continue to operate in the coast guard is through the hard work of folks, individuals, teams. It's crazy that come in, stay late, and just do the things to get us continuing to run, dude, it's very impressive. [00:05:19] Speaker A: It was impressive, and it kind of, like, gave me a little bit of motivation. [00:05:22] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, it definitely. Yeah, man. Absolutely. Yeah. It makes you want to work harder. [00:05:27] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:05:28] Speaker B: You know, and be part of the team. [00:05:29] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:05:29] Speaker B: And I thought that was pretty cool, but, yeah, big shout out to the crew. That was. Gosh, that was a lot of work. [00:05:34] Speaker A: Yeah, huge shout out to. [00:05:35] Speaker B: We don't need to get into the details of the work, and quite honestly, I don't. I don't want to ask too many questions because, you know what happens if you ask too many questions about something. [00:05:42] Speaker A: That investigating officer, you start showing interest. [00:05:46] Speaker B: Do not show too much curiosity. Yeah, just a little bit. [00:05:48] Speaker A: Yeah. This episode will be published way after that investigation is probably done, so good. [00:05:53] Speaker B: Yeah, hopefully. Number two, a little TCTO action going on. Hanger deck is turning and burning. Changing out components on the airframes. Yeah, we had a couple days where we just couldn't train because the aircraft came down, and in order to get them back up, there was a certain level of maintenance required to get them back to a FMC status. [00:06:17] Speaker A: Dude, that was it. Pan the camera over. Right. Pan at 180 degrees. Look at hanger one. [00:06:21] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:06:22] Speaker A: 65 side. Phone parties going off over on the 65 side. We that TCTO and same thing, man. People all. I don't know what eleven aircraft don't. [00:06:35] Speaker B: So let's say 765, maybe three causes. [00:06:39] Speaker A: Yeah. What's that? Mathematic? [00:06:41] Speaker B: Uh, 15. [00:06:44] Speaker A: Yeah. Something around something. A lot of aircraft went down. ATC mobile, all four different things. Um, and then that. Passing over that same sediment over here, the 65 people on the hanger deck ripping out, not ripping out gearboxes, but suspending gearboxes, changing a lot of hardware out, putting it back together, getting helicopters back on the line. Mean, it was court. That was crazy, too, dude. You could feel the energy. [00:07:12] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. Yeah. I still feel it. I think that's probably why I'm so jacked today, dude. [00:07:15] Speaker A: That's what it is. Yeah. [00:07:17] Speaker B: It's just feeding off that energy. [00:07:19] Speaker A: And then I caught on a. But I caught up on a bunch of, like, admin stuff, so it was really boring for me, but, you know. [00:07:24] Speaker B: I needed literally nothing, you know, for us. [00:07:27] Speaker A: Yeah. Stupid officers. [00:07:28] Speaker B: Yeah. Anyways, thanks, guys. [00:07:31] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:07:31] Speaker B: Appreciate you crushed it. What else going on, bud? [00:07:37] Speaker A: Not much. We are getting a bunch of SAR cases coming in. So these next couple episodes, I would say more than a couple, are just going to be SAR case focused, which I think we like doing the most and you like hearing the most. We'll say this at the end of the episode, but please, please, please keep sending them in. We're gonna hit you up. We can get you on the podcast. People are gonna listen to it. People are gonna get pumped to stand duty. Gonna be great. [00:07:58] Speaker B: Yeah, true. [00:07:59] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:08:00] Speaker B: Um, in other news, quick shout out for the upcoming roost. October. [00:08:05] Speaker A: Yep. [00:08:05] Speaker B: Uh, I made jack of the dates. I do not have them in front of me, but I want to say it's October, uh, 16th, 17th, 18th. That should be somewhat accurate. Uh, over in Jacksonville, Florida, I think that they're doing a, you know, uh, paying homage to, um, Kodiak's alpat mission that is no longer with 65s. [00:08:25] Speaker A: Yep. [00:08:26] Speaker B: And then, of course, hitron as well, since it is a home place of hitron. [00:08:30] Speaker A: That's gonna be a really cool, like, 65 centric roost. I feel like. [00:08:33] Speaker B: Dude. Yeah. [00:08:34] Speaker A: You gonna be there? [00:08:35] Speaker B: I'm planning on it, bud. Are you gonna be there? [00:08:37] Speaker A: I'll probably dag along. [00:08:38] Speaker B: Is the podcast equipment gonna be there? [00:08:40] Speaker A: Podcast is going there. We're gonna talk to. They give out awards every year. We'll plan on talk to those crew, maybe talk to some old timers with some good stories. It's gonna be fun. [00:08:48] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. I always like, and I was a big fan of when you and Kenny went to San Diego last time, the aircrew of the year award. And then there was the. Was it rotor wing and fixed wing. Okay. I listened to the rotary wing one. I have to listen to the fixed wing. And, uh. Gosh, dude, the rotary wing case in Kodiak was insane. [00:09:11] Speaker A: It's climbing a mountainous. [00:09:12] Speaker C: It was. [00:09:12] Speaker B: It was dumb, dude. It. I. Mike, I can't. I'm picturing, dude, something that is probably unrealistic, and I'm pretty sure that's kind of how it went. [00:09:21] Speaker A: Yeah, I would. If you haven't listened to it, I'd scroll back and give that one. And the fixed wing. I'm gonna listen. Both were really, really good alaskan cases. There's a shocker for you. [00:09:30] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:09:30] Speaker A: But, man, those crews. And they were fun to interview, man, those. We were. We may have had a few alcoholic beverages. So, you know, it was, uh. Stories were flowing, and it was a good time, and we were laughing. [00:09:41] Speaker B: It is a social lubricant. [00:09:42] Speaker A: It was, you know, and a podcast lubricant, so. Yeah, yeah. Roost. October. Uh, those aren't the right dates. Uh, we will probably post something on a social media platform, which we have MySpace page. [00:09:54] Speaker B: Yeah. The, uh, coast Guard Aviation association also has Facebook, I think. Uh, Instagram. [00:09:59] Speaker A: Yep. [00:10:00] Speaker B: Uh, of course, they have their own website as well. Well, where you can gather some of that information. And, of course, if you're interested in going, I think that the rooms are open. There are things blocked off, so maybe the sooner the better for that one, just in case. [00:10:12] Speaker A: Yeah. High altitude search and rescue out of San Francisco. I feel like we're in a high altitude kind of momentum right now, and I'm not upset about it, so let's. [00:10:21] Speaker B: Kick this one off. I'm not either. If you're going to San Francisco. [00:10:34] Speaker D: Be. [00:10:34] Speaker A: Sure to wear some flowers in your head. [00:10:42] Speaker B: If you go to San Francisco. [00:10:51] Speaker C: You'Re. [00:10:51] Speaker B: Gonna meet some gentle people there. [00:10:57] Speaker A: Speaking of San Francisco, we got a crew out of air station San Francisco who did another, you guess it, high altitude case. [00:11:05] Speaker B: What's going on with these high altitude cases? We just had a recent one in North Bend, right? [00:11:10] Speaker A: Yep, we just did that one. [00:11:12] Speaker B: That was a good one. [00:11:12] Speaker A: Sweet. Well, we'll go down the line here. If you want to kick things off, Joey, tell us a bit about yourself. [00:11:19] Speaker D: Hey, thanks for. Thanks for having us on. [00:11:22] Speaker A: Thanks for coming on. [00:11:23] Speaker D: Yeah. Joey Messina. I'm at CG 711, shift Hilo. Now here from air Station San Francisco. I did five years there. I was in it. Did an AIops tour, and then Miami. Before that, flight school, I was at a sector. Before that. I direct commissioned in the coast guard in 2009 after about a four and a half year enlistment in the air force. [00:11:50] Speaker B: Oh, nice. [00:11:51] Speaker A: Yeah, I know. That's a fun Joey fact that not people many know. [00:11:53] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:11:55] Speaker A: Also fun other fact is, when I was a little c spy ot in Miami, I ran in Joey for the first time. [00:12:00] Speaker B: Oh, really? Is that when you were stationed in Miami? [00:12:03] Speaker A: I was stationed in Miami. [00:12:06] Speaker D: You were a phenomenal odo. [00:12:09] Speaker A: Is that just because you had to stand it less when I was doing it? [00:12:12] Speaker D: Exactly. [00:12:14] Speaker B: And, Joey, these guys had a little odo entourage, didn't they? Wasn't it like a whole pack of these young ot's standing the duty over there? [00:12:22] Speaker D: There were many, but I can tell you Max was a standout dude. [00:12:26] Speaker B: Raving reviews. [00:12:27] Speaker A: That's great. [00:12:28] Speaker B: Good job, bud. [00:12:28] Speaker A: Thanks, Joey. Dan the man. What's happening, brother? [00:12:32] Speaker C: Hey, thanks for having us on. [00:12:34] Speaker A: Yeah. Hey, Dan, I want to give you credit for this one, man. You kind of rallied the troops and got this interview together, so thank you very much. Yeah. Why don't you tell the folks a bit about yourself? [00:12:42] Speaker C: Oh, yeah, absolutely. My name is Dan Whitaker. I'm in my last year at San Francisco. It's my first aviation tour for. That was flight school, and for that I was at a MSSC, Boston, and then Cape Cod, which was what pushed me to go to flight school. [00:13:00] Speaker B: Nice, dude. [00:13:01] Speaker A: Nice, dude. So you were in Boston and San Francisco. Wow, dude. Hardship tours. [00:13:07] Speaker B: I know, man. [00:13:09] Speaker C: It's really difficult being me, if you think about it. [00:13:12] Speaker B: Were you. Were you coming from the academy? [00:13:16] Speaker C: No, I made a wild decision as an 18 year old. I went to. I went to VMI, just like West Point for kids who can't get into West Point. [00:13:25] Speaker B: Okay. Yeah. [00:13:26] Speaker A: Is that like regular college but you pay for people to yell at you? [00:13:31] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:13:32] Speaker C: Like, all the bad part. [00:13:34] Speaker A: Sweet, dude. Well, thanks for coming on and setting this up. Pumped to hear the story, Manuel. What's up, brother? [00:13:42] Speaker E: Hey, guys, thanks for having me. Really appreciate it, Dan. Thanks for getting this together. My name is Manuel de la Rosa. I am a ast out of San Francisco. Currently, I'm in my third year here. It was my number one pick out of Atlantic City. Really happy to be back on the west coast. [00:14:02] Speaker A: Nice. [00:14:03] Speaker E: I've spent the majority of my career on the east coast for whatever reason, between New Jersey and Florida. I've been in since 2011. Did some time on a 378 as an on rate, ended up in BMA school for some reasons outside of my control, and then did that for a while. That was a good time. Driving boats out in Florida is never a bad time. [00:14:35] Speaker A: No. [00:14:37] Speaker E: But after that, I decided to pick up on my original swimmer goal. Ended up in Elizabeth City, enjoyed it so much. Decided to go through school twice. Luckily, the second time around, I ended up walking across stage and graduating. So that was cool. And then my first tour was in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Did I was able to short tour just because of how my graduation date worked out. So I only did three and a half years there, which I'm not upset about. And then I got my number one pick, and that's how I ended up here with Dan, Joey and Tyler. [00:15:22] Speaker B: You'd love to hear it. [00:15:23] Speaker A: Yeah, man. Obviously I came out there for the stand visit now and understand why it's people's number one pick. Man. San Francisco is such a cool unit of. [00:15:31] Speaker E: No. Yeah. Every fight, there's always something to see, something to do. And I've been here three years, and I'm still going down the list. [00:15:39] Speaker B: Gosh dang, man, I am extremely jealous of what you guys do out there with the cliff ops surf stuff like, you know, the inland flying, the offshore flying. I don't know. And you have the benefits of probably better weather than your cousins to the north, like, you know, Humboldt and North Bend and Port Angeles. [00:15:57] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:15:58] Speaker B: So it's like all the perks both, like, maybe sunnier sky sometimes. [00:16:01] Speaker A: Yeah, that's it. [00:16:02] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:16:02] Speaker E: We get a little more sun than I even expected. I'm native to California. [00:16:08] Speaker B: Okay. [00:16:09] Speaker E: And so I spent, like, a good amount of my childhood, like, going up and down the coast and just, I don't know, call it global warming, but there's a little bit more sun than I remember, dude. [00:16:20] Speaker A: I was there for the stand visit, and I had one cloudy day and the rest was sun. And I was like, I think people are lying to me about this fog. [00:16:26] Speaker B: I guess it is a thing, but no. What part of California from? [00:16:31] Speaker E: I'm from the Central Valley. Fresno. [00:16:33] Speaker B: Oh, okay. Nice, man. [00:16:35] Speaker D: Brother. [00:16:36] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:16:36] Speaker B: I grew up in San Diego county. [00:16:38] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, that's the one. Better unit than San Fran. [00:16:41] Speaker B: I don't know. [00:16:43] Speaker A: Sweet. [00:16:43] Speaker E: I don't know. Ventura is up there now. [00:16:45] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. [00:16:46] Speaker B: Don't get me started on Ventura. [00:16:48] Speaker E: Yeah. Enjoying all things socal. [00:16:53] Speaker A: Yeah. Wait, so last but certainly not least, obviously, Tyler. Tyler, you not. Are you at Ventura now? [00:17:00] Speaker F: Yes, I am. [00:17:01] Speaker B: Oh, come on, dude. [00:17:03] Speaker A: You. [00:17:03] Speaker B: You. [00:17:04] Speaker A: Come on. You did the best lateral transfer in the coast guard. [00:17:08] Speaker F: Yeah, I was a pretty interesting. I was at a Ventura prior to San Francisco, too, so it's all working out nice. [00:17:15] Speaker B: Wait, how were you permanent party in Ventura before going up to San Francisco or something? Or how'd that work out? [00:17:21] Speaker F: No, I was at the small boat station. [00:17:23] Speaker A: You went. Okay, hold on. You. You gotta paint your career here because I'm about to be really pissed if you went. Ventura. San Fran. Ventura. [00:17:31] Speaker D: Yeah, correct. [00:17:35] Speaker B: You know what? There are success stories. That makes me happy too. Anyways, if you're looking for a 65 pilot to make a 60 transition in Ventura, I transfer next summer. Tyler. Yeah, just throw up. Throw my name. [00:17:48] Speaker A: I guess we can. Joey is 711. So you can just walk down. [00:17:51] Speaker B: Oh, Joe. [00:17:51] Speaker A: Yeah, he can walk down the office and be like, hey, Max and Nick. [00:17:54] Speaker D: No. Yeah, I'm sorry. Saving that for myself, guys. [00:17:58] Speaker B: Okay, everybody wants vendor. [00:17:59] Speaker A: Tyler. You a tweet or a mech? [00:18:02] Speaker F: I'm a mech. Amt. [00:18:04] Speaker A: Nice, man. And then is, I guess. So you're in your second aviation tour now, is that correct? [00:18:09] Speaker F: Yep, yep. [00:18:10] Speaker D: Correct. Yeah. [00:18:10] Speaker F: Started at Channel on harbor in 2015, and then I was there for four years, then San Francisco for five, and then just got here a few months ago. [00:18:18] Speaker A: Sweet. [00:18:18] Speaker B: That's awesome. Have you already gone through the whole ba. Transition and all that stuff here in mobile? [00:18:23] Speaker F: Yeah, I went to the school in Mobile. And then I have my first flight tomorrow, actually. [00:18:28] Speaker B: Oh, dude, that's awesome. [00:18:30] Speaker A: Sweet, man. [00:18:30] Speaker B: And so how many sixties do you have there right now? [00:18:34] Speaker F: Currently one. [00:18:34] Speaker B: Okay. Gotcha. [00:18:36] Speaker A: Sweet, dude. A one heel unit in southern California, brother. Sign me now. [00:18:40] Speaker B: Leave it that way. [00:18:42] Speaker A: Sweet. [00:18:43] Speaker F: Pretty sweet. [00:18:44] Speaker B: Yeah, but you guys are expecting two more in the. In the near future, hopefully, I imagine. [00:18:47] Speaker D: Yep. [00:18:48] Speaker F: Yeah, right. [00:18:49] Speaker B: Okay, cool, man. [00:18:50] Speaker A: Sweet. [00:18:51] Speaker B: Well, ultimately, I'm jealous of everyone's careers. [00:18:53] Speaker A: Yeah, same here. But, like, we can live vicariously through doing these interviews. I know. [00:18:56] Speaker B: I know it. [00:18:57] Speaker A: Again, Joey, don't forget Max and Nick. West coast. [00:18:59] Speaker B: Okay? [00:19:00] Speaker A: All right. [00:19:00] Speaker B: Okay. It's not Ventura. San Diego would be fine too. And if not those two, then San Francisco will settle for that. [00:19:08] Speaker A: He's hung up anyways. [00:19:09] Speaker B: Anyways. [00:19:10] Speaker A: Hey. Yeah, so let's. Let's kick this off. Joey, if you want to start us, tell us, like, you know, there you were. We had a sar case. And just, you know, we'll go down the line and I'll interrupt and ask questions, man, but we're super pumped to hear about this one. [00:19:22] Speaker D: Cool. Awesome. I'm gonna let Dan do a lot of the recaps. Younger, with a better memory. And so if you guys hear crying, I've got a ten month old baby. It's no big deal, but that's in the back. That's fine. So where was I? I was at home, I think. Was Saturday Saturday or Sunday, Dan? I can't remember, but I was at home with a coffee and a beard. I was taking off calls. [00:19:53] Speaker A: Oh, nice. [00:19:53] Speaker D: I was off duty and Dan was on duty. This copilot was another really good copilot, but this call came in from Cal oes. So the Office of Emergency Services, I believe. [00:20:10] Speaker A: So. [00:20:10] Speaker D: It's just like, you know, your state level kind of clearing house. So it was an agency assist. And there's some details that I didn't get until much, much later. But ultimately there was a female hiker who was deep in the big sur, mountainous, I think on foot. They're probably like 10 miles up a river system, pretty high up in this gorge. And a USAR team. So an urban search and rescue team, which is all volunteer firefighters from different counties and municipalities, they're all together. I think 15 of them had hiked in the night prior to go get her. She had slipped and shattered her ankle. Ouch. What was going on? For whatever reason, in California, we call them atmospheric rivers. Just big, you know, rainstorms, really heavy, kind of slow moving rain dumps, heavy winds, you know, turbulence. So. So these folks unfortunately decided to go camping in the middle of an atmospheric river. [00:21:16] Speaker B: Bad idea. [00:21:17] Speaker D: Bad idea. And so that Utah team, that 15 person ground rescue team had gone in on foot, 10 miles. And most of it is single track trails with river crossings. And they rig up cables. And what they have to do is bring in this litter that's a unicycle. It's literally a litter that's welded onto like a 29 inch mountain bike wheel. [00:21:44] Speaker A: I've seen those things. Those are wild looking. [00:21:47] Speaker D: And so they take turns pushing and pulling. I think they cycle out every few minutes. But it's really challenging. It's really risky for pretty much everyone involved. I mean, but the trail was washing out. The big Sur river was rising. It was just not a good situation. And they just spent the night there where they're camping out in tents, just getting poured on. But the call came in to go get her. And so we plot it. And I'm talking to the skipper, Tyson Hubbardy. Awesome, awesome co and, you know, it's in there. And the weather, the weather is trash. So we were going to have to low level or send the crew to low level up a. Pretty much up the center of a canyon under the atmospheric river. And that's where, you know, a lot of decision making started happening. There was some information that I didn't until 07:00 that night. After the case was wrapped up, I reached out to the incident commander. Kind of fast forwarding, it turns out, and Cal OEs didn't tell us this, which is good and bad. Probably would have changed our decision to take the case, but it was good in that it gave us a competitive mental edge, not knowing the information. But Cal Fire had sent in a 60 that tried to go in the canyon and aborted. And then California highway. Php sent in an acar and they aborted. And then we got, the coast guard says yes to everything, but we didn't know this. [00:23:18] Speaker A: Holy cow. [00:23:19] Speaker D: I thought they had turned down the case. And that's what was brief to me, is that these agencies turned it down. [00:23:25] Speaker A: Yeah, I've heard that happen before, too. It's like, yeah, you know, it's like, okay, cool. You know. Cause that usually happens if there's kind of cruddy weather for agencies who don't have, you know, IFR certified helicopters or multipil. They're like, hey. Or nighttime. They're like, we're gonna turn it down. [00:23:38] Speaker B: Yeah. Two quick questions, Joey. One, what time of year? And two, is this an area that you routinely fly? [00:23:48] Speaker D: Dan, was this February? My blend together with the baby. Okay, so it's February, and yeah, we're pretty familiar with Big Sur. I mean, we've flown that coast I don't know how many hundreds of times. But the. The gorge, I think we had all seen it, you know, in broad daylight and good weather during fairy flights down in Magoo. But that gorge in particular, none of us were familiar with. And so it was. Yeah, that canyon specifically was pretty unfamiliar. There would have been to go into that canyon prior to this. Pretty, pretty sketchy. It was pretty narrow at times. It wasn't more than a couple helicopters wide. [00:24:32] Speaker B: Wow. [00:24:33] Speaker D: Yeah. And then the weather at the coastline was, I don't know, is varying between, you know, 2000, 3000. But once you get in the mountains, that was coming down to like 300. So all the mountains were obscured. And you go into this canyon and you're climbing with terrain. And so it just kind of comes down and I don't know. I think the visibility was anywhere between probably averaging a half mile. Dan can correct me a few times. Probably got down to a quarter in the canyon. And then I think we're getting smacked with 60 miles per hour winds and petty rains. [00:25:06] Speaker A: So you jumping ahead? Yeah, no, no worries. So, yeah, so you're getting. You're taking ops calls and they call you directly. Like they didn't call the crews. [00:25:15] Speaker D: No, the OD called me directly. Then I got on the phone with a. If the government or an agency assists, it's got to go through district. [00:25:25] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:25:25] Speaker D: So I hit up the district command center, D seven, and then talk to DRM. DRM gives the case the blessings we can push forward. And then I'm on the phone with, with the skipper. And the problem was, obviously, this is a high risk case. Right. And the crew composition was what we were kind of mulling overdose. First of all, Dan Whitaker is just. I mean, I can't even share. Cody's just a phenomenal pilot. One of the best. One of the best nuggets that I've ever seen come through the first tour. And just, just I was, I've had the privilege of doing all the upgrades and just. He's just a phenomenal pilot all the way around. His co pilot, another great pilot. But the other pilot had just come off of parental lease, so, you know, had not flown for about three months. We did the warm up, put them on duty. So we're looking at crew composition. So the options were turn down the case or, which we're fine with. That's totally okay. You know, I just want to. For anybody listening in the fleet, that is completely okay. Yeah, nothing wrong with that. The other option was I would come in and bench the co pilot and go fly with Dan and try to pull off the case. Both the co and I did not want to set that precedent. [00:26:53] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:26:55] Speaker D: You know, we really both did not like, you know, what that looked like and how it might copilot, what kind of message it sent. But ultimately, for the well being of the survivor and the USAR team, we decided to give that a shot. So I came in and started working with Dan on the case, and I think ultimately it came down to obviously just beefing up with more experience. But I've been through that phenomenal school you guys put on in Astoria a hars and then, you know, hatch training. And, you know, as Dan tells you about the case, like, I used every bit of both of those schools as well as all of our, the unit specific training programs. Like, you kind of touched on it. San Francisco is super lucky to have a very robust bird surface program, surf ops, and then that Marine Corps Mountain Warfare Training center up in the sierras. So this is something we have practiced for years and years, you know, with, you know, putting to use ahars and hats and burst surface. TTP. Sorry about the baby crying in the back. No, but it used up every bit of that training and experience, I mean. [00:28:09] Speaker A: That'S why those programs exist is, you know, not only to, you know, bolster those, you know, skills and teach folks who don't normally operate in that, but is also for, for folks, you know, who are third tour senior ips to bring that back, but if you have somebody on your bench that is a very senior instructor pilot who has been to both hats and a hars and the other crew not necessarily hasn't been there yet, I, you know, throwing two aircraft commanders on that, man, that was a good call. [00:28:37] Speaker D: Yeah. It's tough though, because you, you always want to give junior folks, you know, as many opportunities as they can to grow. [00:28:45] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:28:45] Speaker D: You know, their skills, but just from just a basic risk management perspective, it was just not the best mix for that kind of case. [00:28:53] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:28:53] Speaker D: So, yeah, like you said, if somebody's available, take it, you do it. If not, it's okay to say no. I just happened to be the only person not on leave and available and sitting at home taking calls. So I passed calls to somebody else and then I came in. I'll let Dan take it. [00:29:11] Speaker A: One more really important question before Dan takes over. Did you shave your beard? [00:29:15] Speaker D: I did not. [00:29:17] Speaker B: Okay. Grizzly Adams. [00:29:19] Speaker A: That's awesome. [00:29:23] Speaker D: Yeah. All right, Dan, take it away. [00:29:26] Speaker C: Yeah. So backtracking just a hair. We took off on our morning trainer. I think it was like my first month of being an AC or so. I'm petrified of almost any and everything. [00:29:40] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:29:41] Speaker C: And we're, you know, we're just flying around looking for, you know, something to do just with the weather not being great in the bay and we get a call from sector just saying I request you RTB and hold on deck. So my first instinct was that I took off below training, like went back and then once we got back, shut down, started talking Joey a bit and then, you know, like working through the training, through the planning process rather. Joey and I met up, kind of made a route, got weight and balance. I've figured out I liked it to swap planes. So we took plane those lighter by like 50 pounds or something. [00:30:26] Speaker A: Hey, that makes all the difference. Let me just, before you keep going. What was the altitude at which the hiker was stranded at? [00:30:33] Speaker C: They were at like 1400ft MSL. [00:30:37] Speaker A: Okay, cool. [00:30:39] Speaker C: So we just like Joey's talking about, we took off out of San Francisco. So we went out the gap which is like over towards the north to west corner of the peninsula, like near land's end. And then once we got clear of that, we started trucking south and then the atmospheric rivers that we were just talking about. Usually we got just perfect wind out of the northwest almost all times of the year. But as soon as the storms rolling the wind switch and come out of the southe. So we were, you know, we're going 120 knots through the air and we're getting, you know, 80, 70, 60, back up to 80 knots over the ground rehearse. [00:31:24] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:31:27] Speaker C: So we ended up, you know, just cruising down there. We picked an initial point that was just at the mouth of the canyon. [00:31:36] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:31:37] Speaker C: And while we're going down there, once we got up pretty much like a beam, Monterey, we switched over to Calcord. That's like the, like the first responder, you know, common frequency they have. So if we're working at our case, you can hear probably three or four, you know, Cal fire trucks working in case and a helicopter working a case somewhere else. Once we got by Monterey, we hit a pine ic, the incident command post. So we got in touch with them. They gave us an updated position as far as where they thought their guys were. They let us know that they were on Marine 16. So all the people that are actually walking with the patient. [00:32:17] Speaker A: Nice. [00:32:18] Speaker C: Which is cool. And then probably Joey's favorite topic, put Marine 16 frequency in the DF and we just started talking to them. Once we got a little ways into the canyon, closer to the point that we thought they would be, we had them do a slow trend count just to kind of match up where they were. It was easy to spot them, you know, like, you know, green trees, brown dirt and a couple guys and, you know, forest yellow. Yeah, but just having the tool just in case you didn't. [00:32:45] Speaker A: That's a. I've had cases with that before, man, and it helps a lot. Let me, let me change gears real quick here, Manuel. When you guys were on the ground before taking off and you heard the, the patient's condition, what were you thinking as far as, like, what you're going to bring on this flight? Oh, we're getting a pipe. It's a test. It's not thunderstorm condition or SAR case. Oh, my gosh. They're counting down from ten on the PA system. What is going on? [00:33:13] Speaker B: We got, we got crying babies in one phone and countdowns on the PA system in another. Sorry, guys. [00:33:17] Speaker A: No, that's what, that's why we do it live. Yeah. Manuel, tell me what you thinking, man. [00:33:22] Speaker E: So initially, you know, first thought that came to my head, Washington, can we fit the litter? And is it worth the extra weight? [00:33:34] Speaker A: Sorry, hold on. They're going to launch a rocket here at ATC. Here. I hope this makes it in the actual episode launch. Sweet. All right, start from the top. Manuel. What you got, dude? [00:33:52] Speaker E: Like, right off the bat, I was thinking the litter, is it worth taking it? Can we afford the wait, how far are we flying? Like, those things were all coming to mind and we actually went back and forth about which, what to use for the case, just because we. I think the initial report was that she was non ambulatory and completely like, wrapped up. [00:34:22] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:34:24] Speaker E: And there was just no way that she was going to move. So we were really stuck or I was really stuck on using the litter just because I didn't want to make the situation worse. I didn't know she had like, suffered a fall that had led to other injuries that. That weren't being assessed or weren't noticed right away. And just like, the ankle was taking all the attention. So I was thinking about these things pretty much the entire time and going back and forth on, like, what's the right thing to do? You know, luckily we talked about it. We got a chance to talk about it as a crew, like multiple times up until like, the very last moment. [00:35:07] Speaker A: Nice. [00:35:08] Speaker E: So I ended up not using litter. Yeah, I use a quick drop. The way the case was described, certainly the litter would have been the best option, but once we got there, things changed, circumstances prevailed and we were able to get it done with the fixture. [00:35:31] Speaker A: We're launching another rocket here, ATC mobile today. It always happens. Yeah, I mean, I'm just going to talk through this. The litter is a big, is a big point of contention in the 65 community. I feel like for every inland case that I've been on or any other case, because I feel like it's so heavy, but when it's needed, it's obvious. Like, when you need a litter, it's pretty obvious. Right. And that helps this decision process, wouldn't you agree? Manual. But when, but when it's like kind of ambiguous, like this, like, hey, ankle injury. Well, whatever it's going. We're going to high altitude area. Like, that's 100 pounds and ten minutes of gas. That's, you know, more power. Yeah, that's a, you know, that. That is one of the things that, that I think the 65 community reels on for SAR cases a lot. [00:36:13] Speaker C: Wow. [00:36:13] Speaker B: Yeah. We can't take everything now. You know, the 60 is fully equipped. I think they always carry a pump. They always carry a litter. [00:36:19] Speaker A: Everything. [00:36:20] Speaker B: Was there any discussion, crew discussion about removing additional equipment, for example, like the life raft or anything in the baggage compartment. [00:36:27] Speaker D: Guys, that's a great question. And, yeah, so eventually we got to that point, but it took a failed first attempt at hoisting and gnarly downdraft. [00:36:45] Speaker B: Okay, we don't have to jump ahead just yet if you don't want to. But I was just. [00:36:48] Speaker D: Yeah, we had thought about it in the beginning, but, you know, as we're cruising down there, we're over the water, and, you know, we knew we had an airport close by, so if we need mixed monster decisions, we knew we could jump into nice Monterey. We still weren't sure if we were going to refuel in Monterey first, but I think, yeah, the slow ground speed really burned up a lot of fuel and got us nice and light. [00:37:16] Speaker A: Sweet. [00:37:18] Speaker D: And we actually. It took. Took a long time to get down there. It's probably. I don't know, guys, you remember probably close to an hour. Oh, wow. Enough time for us to rehearse the inland route, I don't know, half a dozen times or so. But Dan really used the time wisely on the way down. I wish we had a photo of it. I'm sure we do somewhere. But he plotted out turn by turn coordination on the iPad with the view, and then we re rehearsed the turns like rally car drivers, so that we knew if we got messed up IMC, we would slow down. And just remember, once we entered that canyon, we knew we had a right, right, left, right, right, left it was. Which paid off when we entered. And we had a little communication exercise about which. Right. But, you know, memorizing the route and the train in route. Emmanuelle's point, like, we. We went back and forth in that litter because we didn't have information, really good information from Cal OEs. And, man, we. We called. I probably talked to district in Cal OEs about four or five times before we even got off the ground. And they just did not have information, which is a byproduct of how remote big Sur is. And a lot of the California AOr. Yeah, there's no cell service. So a lot of time you get these inland star cases or these coastal cases, and there's an IC stood up, but there's no cell phone service. And it's really frustrating for the command centers. You're asking all these questions as an operator, and they just don't have anything because it's really spotty. A lot of times what's going on is you'll have a firefighter going back and forth from the operating area to an area of cell service. So there's like this, there's this, this kind of lag in information sometimes. You know, they'll have to drive 10 miles to higher ground then call sector back and then go back to the incident campus. [00:39:27] Speaker A: So anyway, and then when you get in radio, radio range then all that information starts flooding in more real time. [00:39:32] Speaker D: And then it blows up and then you realize all you're just going to change. [00:39:36] Speaker A: Yeah. Sweet. So, so you guys, I think Dan, you left off of, you guys basically checked in on 16 and you df to their position. [00:39:45] Speaker C: Yeah. So then we're in the, so enter the canyon and then just making sure that we're briefing up like a good double IMC plan and that whatever we brief. So we fly as far as like you know, 180 or right hand turn, whatever it is. So we started doing the first couple turns and I, weird what Joey alluded to. I had like the Mapquest moment when you got the paper directions and you're in the back of your dad's car. He's like do I go left or right? And I was like are you going right? And he's like are you sure? And I looked down my iPad, I was like, as I feel the plane slightly banking to the right, I'm like, no, no, go left off. [00:40:29] Speaker B: Nice. [00:40:33] Speaker C: Ended up being like an eight mile transit in the gorge just like Joe was talking about. We entered at Pfeiffer beach so you know, maybe like 100ft of elevation. And then once we got back into the canyon ended up being closer to like 800 to 1000ft. And so the adjacent peaks are probably about three or 4000ft. [00:40:55] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:40:56] Speaker C: And the weather at Monterey which is like kind of similar to what we saw at big surrender, I think they're calling overcast at like two or 3000. So we ended up having you know like a, I'd say at best like a 800, like 800 foot ceiling in the canyon. At worst probably like closer to two or 300 with varying visibility. And then just like Joey's talking about again, Windsor out of the south. So we hug the left side of the canyons. We transited eastbound. And so all that wind that dumped over the top of the south side of the canyon as we went east started coming back up. So we transited 50 to 60 knots within probably two or three rotor discs of the mountainside. So we just kept having perfect updraft performance. Like we always talk about like surfing up the mountainside, picking the side. So we're cruising 50, 60 knots. We get back to where the firefighter where the USAR team's at with the patient. And we ended up doing, I'd say, like, because we had probably, like, eight to ten minutes to a 300 pound bingo back to Monterey. We ended up doing, like, a whole bunch of recky passes, which took up gas, but it ended up really saving us because we, we identified where the wind was coming from for our recce passes, and then it would just be like this, you know, momentary wind shift that we'd experienced. So first hoist we were facing, we tried to face west. Yeah, we noticed that, like, every soft and that ground speed would just really pick up during a rookie pass. It's like, okay, winds. Winds are shifting in the canyon, so we got to be, you know, very keenly aware of where that wind's coming from. That all faded, even though we are super light. So once we, you know, get all of our checklists done, call for rescue, take part two, Joey puts me in, like, a perfect, you know, hover. The first attempt the USAR team was at the bottom of a ravine. So the. It was like, they're on that single track trail. The ravine is probably, like, 50 to 60ft wide. [00:43:15] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:43:16] Speaker C: And our sweet spot was, you know, maybe ten to 15ft above the treetops on the side of the ravine and probably, like, 30 to 40ft above the treetops below us, you know, like, you know, 40, 40 some foot trees or something. [00:43:33] Speaker A: Okay, hold on, hold on. Let me pause you right here. What, what's your conversation like? And, Tyler, I want you to pipe up here. What's your conversation like with the pilots? As you're looking at, you know, obviously your pucker factors high as you guys are cruising up this canyon, but you're obviously getting ready for the hoist and back. And what's your conversation like as you're, as you're picking a good area to hoist, to knowing, you know, the pilots are fighting for, for good wins and things in the front? [00:43:58] Speaker F: Yeah, I remember the discussion right when we were pulling into a hover and there really was, like they mentioned before, there's no really good spot to really hoist the grill out of the area where we were at. But I was actually at a heart the month before that. [00:44:16] Speaker A: Oh, nice. [00:44:17] Speaker F: It looked like a normal canopy hoist. So that's what I kind of brought up to the team, and they agreed. And, yeah, whenever we put Della down until we had the abort right when he entered the trees. So that was a pretty spicy, but we got through it. [00:44:33] Speaker A: Yeah. What do you, what do you mean by spicy, Tyler? [00:44:35] Speaker F: What happened on that one, um, I was right. Whenever he started to enter the trees, there's really no, you know, great way to deploy a swimmer through the trees, just nice and slow. And then as he was entering the canopy, I remember hearing, Joe, we call abort, abort, abort. So, from my. The best of my memory brought them up fast as we could. As you know, we're slowly start to moving forward to get a safer flight. [00:45:06] Speaker A: Joey, Joey, why'd you call that a bork? [00:45:09] Speaker D: So that 50 knot headwind that was smacking us on the way down into a downdraft, and also, we took a tailwind. Ideally, when you're going to hoist in the mountains high alt Tudor canyon, you really want the survivor on the upwind side. Unfortunately, they had her on the downdraft side, and there was no way to get her to the updraft side. There's a river, so that same river, you know, the rapids and everything that was separating them so they couldn't move her, they couldn't get her to the correct side of the canyon. It was just the worst possible spot, but just the worst spot, and then the worst atmospheric. But when we pulled in, I think we still had a 10% power margin. Right, guys? Maybe 12%. And what happened? As soon as they started punching de list of the trees, we took a tailwind, power spiked, and we just started coming down. [00:46:09] Speaker A: Yeah, you saw that VSI just dumped, too. [00:46:11] Speaker D: It just started coming. Yeah. And look, I mean, Dan, I don't think you were on modes or anything. Yeah. You were hand flying the whole thing. And so he was arresting the rate of descent, but we were pulling up to 100, and I knew this was only going to end one way, so we had to get airspeed, like, quickly. [00:46:29] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:46:29] Speaker D: You know, as soon as Tyler started pulling him back up, Dan did a phenomenal job just pinching the cyclic forward and pulling out to just to get a little bit of airflow that I had. But, yeah, it wasn't. It wasn't going to work out. [00:46:45] Speaker C: We were. [00:46:46] Speaker D: We were dropping that downdraft was just. Just rough, really steep. [00:46:50] Speaker A: Dan, did you feel that you're kind of like, you know, when you're. When you're. The ass drops out from underneath the helicopter and you just feel that descent? Did you kind of feel it right as he was calling for abort? [00:47:00] Speaker C: Oh, yeah. Like, it. It happened really quickly, and I think it was just. [00:47:06] Speaker D: I'm not. [00:47:06] Speaker C: I feel like at that point, I wasn't looking at the instruments, you know, it's just like I'm holding on to my two trees that I've got. As soon as I see the branches start going down, I just started pulling up. And if we hear a dink, then we hear a dink. [00:47:17] Speaker A: Heck, yeah, dude. Pull all the guts out of it. Cool. So. So, Tyler, you're. You're pulling, man. Well, back up. Um, and then he clears the treetops, and you're. You're like, what are you thinking at that point? [00:47:29] Speaker F: Um, well, that point, once he cleared the trees and we're starting to move forward, I knew we were already at bingo. So just got him in the cabin quick as possible. And then, um, we were planning, you know, for round two. [00:47:41] Speaker A: Sweet. Yeah. So you want. Danny wants to tell us about round two. [00:47:46] Speaker C: Yeah, absolutely. So we did the whole thing in reverse. We went over to Monterey. On the way there, we kind of reentered that discussion about, in terms of what year we were talking about, and I think Daler really led the discussion really well because we got kind of, like a preliminary look at the survivor. So they had, like, she was on that litter, but, you know, the more, you know, the more we looked at it. Once they got that, like, space, space blanket offer, you know, just. They really led discussion saying, like, you know, I, you know, saw. We saw. We all saw the patient, she just got something wrong with her. She shattered her ankle. And then we all agreed, like, you know, there's no, they said non ambulatory. Sure. But, you know, this is. We need, you know, we need to remove that hundred pounds. And so we ended up taking out the litter, the craft, and I think the basket, we refilled 800 pounds. [00:48:47] Speaker A: Nice. [00:48:52] Speaker C: You know, just kind of discussion as far as what we're doing, just to kind of rehash exactly we talked about before. Now, knowing that, you know, we. We went into hoist. We had a 12%, 1012 percent torque margin, and that went right to, you know, nothing. Yeah, still settling. And so he just said, okay, like, we'll give one more try. Just kind of setting, you know, another short wicket ahead of us. Instead of saying, okay, we're going to go in and hoist and then attack the rest of it. Just like, let's just take off and see what we're doing. And the canyon. Yeah, one step at a time. [00:49:22] Speaker A: Is the weather improving at this point, or is it just staying the same? [00:49:25] Speaker C: I think it's pretty much just staying the same. [00:49:27] Speaker A: Nice. Of course it does. [00:49:30] Speaker C: Yeah, naturally. So we do the same thing. I remember the turn this time, and actually, we're kind of on the way there and I just shot the flight plan over to Joey's iPad, since Joey's flying from the left seat. And I gave the iPad back to. I think I gave it to you, Tyler. Yep. And then. So Tyler's back me up on turn. [00:49:58] Speaker A: Nice. [00:49:58] Speaker C: And then Dale, now that we've seen it once daily, can kind of back me up. So I don't have that mapquest moment again. Just saying, like, hey, we're gonna keep the river out of our right hand side. [00:50:07] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:50:10] Speaker C: So we get back in there, and as we left, Joey identified a spot probably a quarter mile up the trail. That was. It was like, kind of like a sheer forested wall, like, going straight down the cliff face ish single track trail. And then, you know, more forest, which. Which looked a lot better than hoisting into ravine. Yeah, the same. Same setup, same. Same calculus that we used before. And Joey put me. Put me in a hover again in the. In the new spot. And what it ended up being, when we called. When I called for rescue check part two, it was like there's a, like a pine tree off our nose about a disk. And then I've got another pine tree about a half disk off my right shoulder. Joey's got a pine tree about one to two discs off the left. And then Tyler's keeping us clear about, for the pine tree about a disc off the tail. So we're in this, like, perfect little pocket. [00:51:15] Speaker A: Nice. [00:51:19] Speaker D: I'll jump in real quick, Dan. So when. When we had left the first time, I'll go out and say, I think as a crew, after that first downdraft and the abort, I think as a crew, we were like, probably more than 50% done with this case. We were like, yeah, that. This is you. We only wanted to navigate that canyon once. We didn't want to do that twice. And then after feeling the downdraft and knowing the. We probably hit the limits of our skill and the aircraft's abilities. But when we went out to the ground crew on the radio, you know, you could just hear it in their voice. It was almost like they were begging us to come back. Yeah, get back in there. And you could kind of hear that they were. They were really struggling. They really just hike her out. And so they said they're like, are you guys coming back? Yeah, we're gonna try. You know, I'm like, I gotta go come up with a new plan. I'm gonna go to Monterey. I'm gonna give another shot. Yeah. I was like, you guys gotta try to hike her about a half mile down this trail, there's kind of like a spot on a knoll, like. Like Dan was saying. And, God, it was slick. That trail is just washing out kind of paints there. Again, that's a. That that track is on the side of the mountain. And then slip. It's like hundreds of feet, maybe as much as a thousand feet down to the bottom of the canyon. [00:52:51] Speaker B: God. [00:52:52] Speaker D: And they. I think they just were really afraid of having to do this in those conditions with that unicycle thing. You know, it's interesting. They had just done identical case, same exact spot back in January, like a month prior to this, during previous atmospheric river. Another similar case. I don't know why people go camping during this condition. [00:53:13] Speaker A: Because it's cozy. [00:53:15] Speaker D: Yeah, there's a hot spring back there. It's like a 13 miles hike. [00:53:18] Speaker B: Geez. [00:53:20] Speaker D: But they. I think that crew had members go to the ER for Rhabdo from trying to hike that. [00:53:27] Speaker A: Oh, wow. [00:53:28] Speaker D: This is a really. Is a really challenging way to do Sar on the ground, you know, and they rig up cables and they hook up the unicycle and they try to get across these rivers, what have you. But when we. When we got back to the airport, we. We kind of slowed everything down. I made some phone calls to make sure that I was looking at risk correctly, you know, and everything. And I. And we gathered up, I was going to give the crew the opportunity to say their piece and pull the plug if they want to. Very important CRM, making sure you're not forcing people into a situation they don't want to be in. So we. We huddled up in the beautiful fBO and got some coffee and we kind of painted a picture. And, you know, the crew, Tyler and Dale, were also about flicking out the aircraft. I think we did take the litter, but we. We removed the crew raft basket and, I mean, Dayla was dropping everything. We didn't need all the little. Just left them on deck there. And then we. Yeah, like Dan said, we. We took just enough gas to make sure that we were going to be at a 200 pound bingo when we got there. Yeah, we wanted all the possible power. I was okay landing below at 200, but we will. We wanted all the power available. But when we reentered the canyon again, it was just. It was really interesting. Everyone was very focused. Everyone knew their role, and everyone was very, very involved. It was pretty awesome. [00:55:04] Speaker A: That's awesome. [00:55:04] Speaker D: Everyone was on. But to get to that, that hover position now with our nose facing in the right direction, we really had to stuff ourselves into that pocket of trees, which was uncomfortable. But again, phenomenal stick skills by Dan. And he was dealing with Dan. Would we have like 30% power fluctuations for those evolutions the whole time? [00:55:29] Speaker C: I think so. [00:55:30] Speaker A: Gosh, that's one thing to have that over the water, but having 30% power fluctuations when you're near trees doesn't sound fun. [00:55:36] Speaker D: Yeah, but, yeah, not fun. But Dan. Dan didn't lose a foot. [00:55:40] Speaker A: Nice. [00:55:41] Speaker D: Yeah, yeah, it was solid. What was really, what really stuck out to me is we were still briefing a Dale, I can correct my memory if I'm wrong. I think we were still briefing this litter deal, this litter hoist. [00:55:56] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:55:58] Speaker D: Dale is about to come to the door and he says, he asks us what's our bingo? And I said, yeah, you got five minutes to get the job done. And he said, screw the litter. Let's do a direct. Pops up door and does a direct. [00:56:10] Speaker B: There you go. [00:56:11] Speaker D: That's awesome. He goes down to the trail, stays connected, pulls that girl out of their little unicycle, and he comes up as a satco. And he made that. You know, he made that call. We took exactly 5 seconds to concur and sent him out the door that way. And that was his initiative. And, you know, he. It was, it was excellent. It made sure we didn't get glued to a really dumb idea. [00:56:32] Speaker B: Very good day. [00:56:33] Speaker A: What a badass job. Dude. That is, um, that is something that I feel like is very specific in the 65 community is we make those, you know, decisions on the fly based upon, you know, what we're seeing. Um, dude, nice, nice work. [00:56:47] Speaker E: Thank you. Thank you. Yeah, thanks, Joey. [00:56:50] Speaker A: Yeah. Did you. So did you. You just saw her and you like, looked at bingo and you're like. Cause that's another thing is when I asked the question and Dala, tell me if I'm. If you've experienced this too. But, like, the word ambulatory paints a picture. But I don't think everybody uses it the same. Like, when we talk about non ambulatory, I'm almost thinking the person is unconscious. [00:57:11] Speaker E: Yeah, that's kind of what my mind goes to is if they're saying non ambulatory, they're like, incoherent. Like they can't even stand up. [00:57:18] Speaker A: Yeah. You're going to have to drag them into something. [00:57:21] Speaker E: Right. So I think that maybe. Yeah, I guess for all of us to get on the same page on what exactly that means. But I think what they meant was for the situation that she was in, it was not safe for her to stand up on her own? [00:57:38] Speaker A: Yeah, sure. [00:57:40] Speaker E: And I think that just from, you know, having to hop around on one leg for who knows how long, her other leg was just tired and that she just. She needed help. So it wasn't necessarily that she was, you know, totally helpless. [00:57:56] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:57:56] Speaker E: It was just that, you know, with how slick the trail was and how wet everything was and just for how long she had been out there struggling on 1ft, she just. They couldn't risk trying to put her on her feet. [00:58:11] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:58:11] Speaker E: By herself, which totally made sense. [00:58:13] Speaker A: So they punch you through the canopy and you get down there, like, what. What are you doing? Like, you obviously got her back up. [00:58:21] Speaker E: Pretty quickly, so, yes, on the first hoist, I was just, like. I still couldn't tell where she was because there was so many people down there. [00:58:31] Speaker A: Oh, interesting. [00:58:32] Speaker E: That they were, like, hurdled or gathering around her, just trying to keep her out of the elements. And so it wasn't until I broke through the canopy for, like, a second before they pulled me back up that I was able to see her. And she was very, like, aware, very awake. [00:58:51] Speaker A: Nice. [00:58:52] Speaker E: And we almost made eye contact right before they pulled me back up. So that kind of made me feel better about using the quick drop. Like, if she was, you know, with her head back and just looked like she was in agony. But she was actually in pretty high spirits. They were just trying to keep her from becoming hypothermic or going into shock. [00:59:13] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:59:14] Speaker E: So that's why it looked worse than it did. But being able to have that initial evaluation, even just for a second, was a huge win and a huge confidence booster for me to just be like, listen, guys, I know we've been talking about this litter, but given the urgency of the situation and how limited we are, I think the best move for everyone involved, not just the patient, is for me to try to make this quick shot work. [00:59:44] Speaker B: Nice. [00:59:44] Speaker A: Hell, yeah, dude. Good call. Um, Tyler, for that second hoist. Is it. Did you do anything different or was the helicopter just set up in a good enough place where you could just, you know, you could put daylight down? [00:59:56] Speaker D: Oh, yeah. [00:59:57] Speaker F: It was like a perfect, steady hover. Dan did a great job. And, yeah, put Dala directly down. I don't really recall how high. I mean, it was. We were up there. I don't know if it was. [01:00:08] Speaker C: That's probably. [01:00:08] Speaker F: Well, overdose. Hundred feet, I would say. I don't remember. Yeah. But they left straight down. And then within a few seconds, that girl was, like, just hopping towards dayla jumping. She was excited to come up and. [01:00:26] Speaker A: She was hoppy, ambulatory. [01:00:28] Speaker F: Yeah. [01:00:29] Speaker A: Yeah. That's cool, man. And then, and then. So did you have to do much conning or did you pretty much just park the helicopter right over where you wanted to go in just two blocks? [01:00:37] Speaker F: The thing only for the recovery, had to con him back a little bit. And then it was pretty hard to see Dala, but I'm pretty sure he gave me a head nod and that's whenever decided to bring him up. And, yeah, it was very smooth operation. [01:00:53] Speaker A: And you said you're at a hars the week prior? [01:00:56] Speaker F: A few weeks, yeah, I was there in January. [01:00:59] Speaker A: So did that, didn't, did you do the camp Riley, like inland day? [01:01:05] Speaker F: Yep. Yep. [01:01:07] Speaker A: That, that. Did you, did you? Yeah. Did you, did you, did you draw on that quite a bit while you were, while you were doing this one? [01:01:14] Speaker F: Yeah, it opened my eyes up a lot on the options that you have, you know, when you're hoisting in mounds and then also just the confidence was there just doing it and it definitely helped. [01:01:25] Speaker A: Nice, man. Dude, that, that's awesome. Sounds like the perfect crew pairing. [01:01:29] Speaker F: It was awesome. [01:01:30] Speaker A: Sweet. So when, uh, yeah, quick strop, sad poo, back up recovery. Um, and then, Dan, when you heard, uh, you know, swimmers, obviously, probably. Tyler said, yep. Swimmer and survivor. Clear the treetops. Did you, uh, did you go ahead and unclench and take a deep breath? [01:01:47] Speaker C: Yeah. So Joey, uh, I think Joey probably saw my shoulders connected to my ears and he took controls and I just came up probably 50ft, hovering on, like one to 2% power margin transition forward. And then. Yeah, I was, like, super excited. And the ground party called us and I wanted to, I was, like, super excited because I think this is my, this is my first, like, case. Yeah. And so I got really excited and I started talking really fast. I was like, I gotta slow down and sound cool. [01:02:25] Speaker A: Yeah, guys, work with you. That was so much cool. Okay, I'll see you later. [01:02:28] Speaker E: Bye. [01:02:31] Speaker B: Heck, yeah. And did you continue to hand fly that entire hoisting evolution? [01:02:38] Speaker C: Yeah, I think because we've, I've tried vert surface a couple times using balt hog, and I think in that, like, I think maybe at the cliff, if it's a nice day, it holds it pretty well. It's pretty stable. But I think, you know, just with what we were dealing with, I didn't want to, I felt more comfortable, kind of like, you know, I've got my, my front and back reference. I've got my up and down reference, I've got my left right reference. Like, I'm just gonna hold it right here and just wait until it's done. Just listening to Tyler. [01:03:13] Speaker B: Yeah, that's really cool. Especially with so many, like, trees nearby. I know you guys were, like, half rotor distance to some of them. Of course, you have a good visual reference. And one thing I don't like about some of the hover modes when you're tight on power is that it almost feels like you're fighting the torque limiting sometimes, which to me is like more of a distraction than anything. [01:03:30] Speaker A: A little disorienting, to be honest with you, because you expect the helicopter to do one thing. [01:03:33] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:03:34] Speaker A: And then you're trying to make a correction and fight it's. [01:03:37] Speaker B: You're kind of fighting the computer a little bit, and I don't like that mix. You know what I mean? It's either working. It's working for you, or it's. Or. Or you're, you know, you've taken over full control. [01:03:46] Speaker A: Yeah, I know. It gets too much at that point. [01:03:48] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:03:49] Speaker A: Sweet. And the. The transit back obviously went, you know, you did the reverse route through the canyon again. Was that. Was that challenging, you know, the second time, or was, you know, just kind of the same thing? Back to Monterey, I'm guessing, right where EMS would be. [01:04:03] Speaker C: Yeah, it was super smooth doing it for the, I guess, seeing that route for the fourth time. And I think we were sitting at zero minutes to a turn. Mango in a hover. [01:04:15] Speaker A: Nice. [01:04:15] Speaker C: So then we made some gas, and then by the time that we exited the canyon, we still had that 45, 50 knot tailwind up to Monterey. So it's like, you know, all of a sudden we're back in the green. We're as happy as we can be. [01:04:27] Speaker A: Oh, hell, yeah. That's a good feeling. And then prior core, I guess, you know, she wasn't in that bad a shape where you needed to, like, really worried about Ems. But. Did you have Ems waiting for you there at Monterey? [01:04:41] Speaker C: We did. I think. I think Dale was. He was like, he had, like, a note set up on his phone or something, but he, like, got her settled, and then they were like, you know, typing back and forth just to, you know, kind of talk, keep her focused and engaged. And then once we landed at Monterey, Ems was out there, you know, a couple minutes. And I think besides the Mapquest thing, I think the funniest thing was probably the lead paramedic came up to us, and she's like, what's going on? She's asking a bunch of questions, and Dale is kind of taking over, and she gets a sense she's like, you guys didn't really have that much time to evaluate her, huh? You just brought her here and it was like, yeah, I guess. [01:05:28] Speaker A: Yeah. You ever see that video of the surfer? He's like, yeah, drop in, smack the lip, drive in. That's kind of like how that whole case was. [01:05:38] Speaker D: The elite EMs lady was being kind of snarky with Dayla and she's asking him all these questions. And at some point, by the fifth question, he looks at her and says, well, why don't you just ask the patient? She's awake. [01:05:55] Speaker B: Yep. Dude, that's always funny, dude. For like, the medical folks always expect probably more out of us than we are willing to give. And I think. I think they don't realize that we are basically a flatbed pickup truck. [01:06:07] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:06:07] Speaker B: And that's really hard to drive. And our goal is to really take people to a higher level of care. Right. We can. We can do certain things, but, bro, we are little. We're a little pickup truck, you know what I mean? And we're going to get you from point a to point b. [01:06:20] Speaker A: And we're a little scared in front sometimes, too, and we just want it to be done with. [01:06:24] Speaker B: Exactly. [01:06:25] Speaker E: Yeah. [01:06:26] Speaker B: Good for you, man. [01:06:27] Speaker A: That's a great case. [01:06:28] Speaker B: Yeah, really, really good case. [01:06:30] Speaker A: That just because I. That happened right after I came. No, right before I came for the stand visit. Yeah, right. [01:06:37] Speaker D: March. [01:06:37] Speaker A: I was in there. Yeah. [01:06:39] Speaker D: When did you come in? [01:06:41] Speaker A: Yeah, I think you were telling me about it when you took me on the high altitude day, Joey. [01:06:45] Speaker D: Okay. [01:06:46] Speaker A: Yeah, you were. Yep. I remember talking about that. But yeah, I've been really pumped to hear about this case ever since then, so I really appreciate it. [01:06:53] Speaker D: Yeah, yeah, it was good. Unfortunately, we got smacked even worse on the way home. On the transit home, we decided not to climb up and punch over the Santa Cruz mountain because of an icing layer. Got to go over 4500ft to take the straight shot over the mountain range to get back to SSo. But there was an icing layer right around 5000. [01:07:16] Speaker A: Holy cow. [01:07:17] Speaker D: You don't mess with margins that thin. And that was another reason, like going IFR was not an option for us to out of a canyon anyways. But gosh, yeah, you gotta climb pretty high to get over those padres. [01:07:30] Speaker A: So did you guys just shoreline back it then? Is that what you're saying? [01:07:33] Speaker D: Yeah, but then we hit one of the bands and of the storm that, you know, we were trying to avoid and we ended up flying like 2300ft off the water with massive downdraft and turbulence and down to like a quarter of a zero biz. And we're just riding the radar on the way home. It's just dirt driving, right. So we're thinking we're gonna get a, you know, after all this and we're just gonna high five and. And have a sunset flight home. And then we just gotta. We got whooped. [01:08:02] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:08:03] Speaker B: You always expect the job, like, once you're done with it, with the sortie, and you have delivered the survivor or the patient to a ems, you're like, sweet, man. Easy cruise home. [01:08:11] Speaker A: Yeah. A cup of coffee and a cookie. [01:08:13] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly. [01:08:14] Speaker D: Yeah. [01:08:14] Speaker B: Like I said, the exact opposite. [01:08:16] Speaker D: Thank you for what you did and that didn't happen. Yeah. [01:08:20] Speaker B: Dang. [01:08:20] Speaker A: Are you coming back? [01:08:22] Speaker B: Don't rest until you're. Until you're finally home. [01:08:25] Speaker A: Yeah, so that. [01:08:26] Speaker D: Yeah. [01:08:26] Speaker A: So, you guys, was it. Was it dark by the time you go into that band or was it. [01:08:29] Speaker E: Just sunset starting to get dark? [01:08:32] Speaker D: Right? [01:08:33] Speaker E: Yeah, yeah, it was just getting dark. [01:08:35] Speaker D: Yeah. So we. We touched down right before sunset, which is good. [01:08:39] Speaker B: Nice. [01:08:40] Speaker D: Do this in the dark at all. [01:08:42] Speaker B: Oh, gosh. [01:08:43] Speaker D: Yeah. It would have been horrible if at. [01:08:47] Speaker E: The end of everything, we then had to deal with that at night. That would have just like. [01:08:51] Speaker D: Yeah. [01:08:52] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:08:53] Speaker D: I wanted. I want to touch real quick on, like, safe ways to do this. Right, that. Listen to this. And they're gonna say, you guys did what? You stuffed yourself into a canyon. Did what? But, um, for the folks who have been to ahars and hats, I really hope that they're bringing that. That training back to the unit. And every time you're out there on an RT and you're bored, there's so many ways to get creative and practice what they taught us, you know? And really, and that's really how you, you hone that skill and build that muscle memory. But if you do have to fly high altitude or close terrain, it's so important to really understand wind train analysis and really understand and make sure that you are in the upwind side of wherever you're flying, and you go around the bends, that may switch to the other side. And so there's a lot of evaluation there. You know, looking at the VSI, the true airspeed versus, of the ground speed, and you want to get, you know, the best power margin you possibly can. So that 50, 60 knots, I think we're only pulling like 40% as we're flying through there. And that slower airspeed, you know, that gives you a better turn radius. So if that canyon walls out or you go in and verdant or you're about to go inverting. You are at a slow enough air speed to increase your reaction time to see things as they come in that slow air speed. Nice tight turning radius to do a 180, which is the other, you know, thing about picking a side. Always pick a side of the canyon. You know, fly straight up the center of the canyon. That won't end well if it falls out. So always pick the updraft side. Try to free up that power margin which might. Might require you to fly fairly close, you know, in that laminar zone to terrain, you know, to free up that power. But slow speed, tight 180s if you need it to turn back around if it doesn't look good up ahead. But that was kind of the name of the game going in there, you know, big power margins, slow speed. Hug a side of the canyon and give yourself a good turning rating. [01:10:55] Speaker A: Yeah. So I think I know your answer to this, but you're a big fan of the hars courses and the hats courses. And your advice to people who want to go is keep pushing for those courses. [01:11:10] Speaker D: Yeah, keep pushing. I really hope that we get to a point where we can increase the number of seats at that ahar school, you know, even if you can't go to hats. Ahars is hands down the best training that I've ever gotten in the Coast Guard. So I really hope as a service, we can somehow get there. It's a pretty heavy ask to have our crews operate in the environments and the conditions and the types of cases that we roger up to without that skill set. So I really hope that we can get to a service where that doesn't take two tours or three tours to get to that. That becomes kind of a standard to go to Ahars. I really hope that's. [01:11:58] Speaker A: Yeah, I agree. Maybe you can walk a couple doors down and make that happen. [01:12:03] Speaker D: Okay. I'm trying to ruffle any feathers yet. [01:12:06] Speaker A: Ruffle them. [01:12:07] Speaker B: You're only there for a couple of years. You gotta ruffle them. [01:12:09] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:12:10] Speaker B: Right away. [01:12:10] Speaker A: Yeah, you gotta start it early, make. [01:12:12] Speaker B: A name for yourself. [01:12:13] Speaker A: No, I agree. And as we start to wrap this up, and then since you're already chatting, Joey, I just wanna go down the line. Anything you would have done differently. And this is not to, like, call you out or anything. This is like, you know. You know, I just. You know, these are good lessons learned from folks who are listening to these because I know I take a lot of these lessons learned and put it in my own tool bag. [01:12:36] Speaker D: No, this was one of the few. I mean, I like all of us. I mean, I analyzed the heck out of this many times after. But you try to get as much information as you can going into it. [01:12:49] Speaker A: Right. [01:12:49] Speaker D: You have all these risk assessments. And then we got there, we had another opportunity to decide if we were going to push forward. We did our recce passes and use all the information we had at hand to figure out where to put our nose. And that didn't work out. No, this was one of those situations where I think there was so much communication and so much gathering and making these real time decisions to keep the safety margins high. Yeah, I actually, for once, you know, this wasn't something that I was beating myself up over. I was pretty happy with the. Pretty happy with the planning and the crew coordination. Yeah, I think I was okay with this one. [01:13:33] Speaker A: I think a good. A good point to take away from this, from some folks who are listening and becoming aircraft commanders. And I know I experienced this, you know, as, during my first cases as an aircraft commander. But the tendency and the feeling to rush because somebody's in danger is almost overwhelming sometimes. Um, whereas most of the cases where lives were still saved, the difference between making your 30 minutes launch window or maybe delaying and have an extra 15 minutes of conversation makes the flight that much safer, and the patient is not going to expire, you know, in those extra 15 minutes. And it sounds like this was the case. You know, they definitely need to come off that mountain. There was no way they could safely go down the mountain, but they did not need to be evac within a certain, like, you know, within, you know, 15 minutes didn't make all the difference. And it sounds like you guys took breaks and you guys talked and took your time, and, you know, that makes all the difference. [01:14:30] Speaker D: You're exactly right. Yeah. I think the majority of our cases do not need us blazing out there. Meeting. You really want to try to meet the window, especially for those urgent SAR cases, because I have been on those cases where every second where people are treading water, exposed, you know, offshore in 50 degree water, and they're going hypothermic. There are those cases where every second matters, but you really have to slow down, control your emotions, and analyze if this is one of those cases. And this was our launch window, the first time was an hour and a half, and then we got back to Monterey and took another hour to sort things out and come up with another plan. Your point? So there's a time and a place to slow things down and. And really make sure that you are not glory seeking, that you're not acting on emotion. It's really important to keep your control and keep your iq up and make the right decisions. [01:15:22] Speaker A: Absolutely. Dan, what about you, man? Any. Any takeaways? Any things that you wish you would have done different or thought of or brought up or not brought up? [01:15:34] Speaker C: No, I think. I think it was. I think it was really good for, like, my development as a new AC, just seeing, like, you know, whatever. Like, whatever elements of the situation that you can change to optimize your performance. Like, you know, do that and, you know, like we talked about, there's not a lot of. Not a lot of on scene information and, like, you were just talking about, again, you know, we had. We had breaks to kind of talk things over and think it over and just letting. Letting whatever the situation gives you, gives you inform the decisions that you're about to make. Because it's like if we, you know, if we don't get that first look at the survivor on the aborted hoist, then maybe that, you know, saying, like, you know, like, maybe that change locations doesn't happen or, you know, daily kind of doesn't get the look in her eye or, you know, like, when. Right. He's about to come up on the first one, just kind of like, hey, I don't. I don't think we need a litter. Just kind of sitting short, wicked through yourself and using the information that you get to the, you know, to its most advantageous. [01:16:36] Speaker A: Yeah. Awesome, man. Yeah, definitely. It sounds like it. You could really quickly jump to the conclusion that that first abort was a wasted hoist, but it sounds like that was not the case at all. Everything kind of panned out. You got a visual. [01:16:51] Speaker B: That's what I was thinking, too, when I was listening to you guys. Like, the fact that Dala was able to basically get eyes on the survivor, that kind of changed the trajectory of the whole. Because otherwise, you guys probably would have proceeded with that litter, right, if you hadn't gotten eyes on them. And I don't know, who knows what that would have done with fuel and time on scene and stuff like that. But with already tight margins, I'm sure you guys would have been having a little bit of extra stressors. [01:17:16] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:17:17] Speaker D: Yeah. Tyler, was that your. I think that was your first live voice. Is that right? [01:17:22] Speaker F: It was. [01:17:22] Speaker A: Oh, boy. [01:17:24] Speaker D: Yeah. [01:17:25] Speaker F: Way to. [01:17:26] Speaker B: That's an awesome one, dude. [01:17:27] Speaker A: Heck yeah, man. So what. So what about you, man? Anything you would have done differently or, like, your biggest takeaway from this whole thing? [01:17:34] Speaker F: Um, only thing I would have done differently myself is I think even, like, halfway through the canyon, I was just pretty pumped up, obviously, that we were gonna, you know, try to save this individual. And I was already jumped on my gunner's belt. I got reminded of some pretty heavy turbulence that, uh, probably should just be in my flight next seat. [01:17:56] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:17:56] Speaker F: So within, like, seconds, I found myself. I know it's not standard practice, but I quickly jumped in there and I was double strapped in just from the turbulence that I was experiencing. So I would have stayed in my seat a little longer, but no, it was, it went well. [01:18:11] Speaker A: Nice, man. [01:18:12] Speaker D: Yeah. [01:18:12] Speaker A: That's interesting. That's a, that's a good, good little tidbit. Sounds like this whole thing was non standard practice. So you do things that, you know, you do things that you need to do to, you know, feel safe in the helicopter for transits, but. Yeah, man, that's actually a really good one. Dale, what about you, man? Anything takeaway or lessons learned? [01:18:34] Speaker E: Honestly, the whole experience for me was a lesson learned just because my first time in the canyon. My first time, like, dodging weather like that. [01:18:48] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:18:49] Speaker E: And then it was also my longest transit to a star case. [01:18:53] Speaker A: Oh, interesting. Okay. [01:18:55] Speaker E: Which, in theory, sounds cool because you have more time. But I took that opportunity to overthink everything. [01:19:04] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:19:06] Speaker E: Which ended up working out for the best. But at some point, I had to really bring myself back and just be focused on what's happening, like, in the moment. So I kept trying to get ahead of myself. And as soon as we got into the canyon, it was so overwhelming to be that close to. I was like, I can see birds in trees, like, at the very tops. And it was like you could see hikers going in and out of the trail or the canyon. And they were so small. And then when we started getting deeper, they were like, I could make out, like, faces and what they had in their hands. And I was like, why are we that close? [01:19:55] Speaker B: You're like, what am I doing right now? Yeah, why am I here? [01:20:00] Speaker E: It was one of those moments where part of me was like, wow, this is so cool. Like, we're about to, you know, get this person, and I'm flying through a canyon and everything is awesome. The view was just incredible. [01:20:13] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:20:13] Speaker E: And then the other part of me was like, like, at what point do I panic? [01:20:18] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:20:20] Speaker E: Like, at what point do I tell them, like, hey, guys, I'm. I'm not, I can't do this. Right, you know? [01:20:25] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:20:26] Speaker E: And it was, it was going very much back and forth. And I think what. What kept me calm was basically coming out of myself and relying on my crew. [01:20:36] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:20:37] Speaker E: Joey especially, like, the level of calm that he brought to the aircraft especially when Dan made that wrong turn like that. I think that moment kind of sealed it for me. [01:20:51] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:20:53] Speaker E: Because the way Joey reacted was just like, okay, this is what you did. This is what we were supposed to do and this is what we're gonna do now. [01:21:01] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:21:02] Speaker E: And it was so calm. [01:21:05] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:21:05] Speaker E: Like, it almost surprised me. And it. It checked me. It put me back into my seat. [01:21:10] Speaker A: Nice. [01:21:10] Speaker E: And was like, okay, well, obviously Joey's got this. [01:21:13] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:21:13] Speaker E: Like, no matter what happens, like, Joey is gonna make this work. [01:21:18] Speaker A: Nice. [01:21:19] Speaker E: So I put all of my stress anxiety onto Joey's shoulders and just let him have it. And I was just in the back. And then when they told me, like, hey, just look out the window. Keep eyes on the river. [01:21:31] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:21:32] Speaker E: I had never stared at a river so hard in my life. I was, like, laser focused. [01:21:38] Speaker A: Nice. [01:21:39] Speaker E: Like, on that river, I was like, I have a job. This is what I need to do. [01:21:42] Speaker A: This is my job. [01:21:44] Speaker E: Me and this river are connected now. [01:21:47] Speaker A: I am the river. [01:21:49] Speaker E: Right. And I was like, yeah. And kind of staring at the river flow. Like, really caught. Like, the whole thing was just perfect. [01:21:56] Speaker A: Heck, yeah, dude. [01:21:57] Speaker E: The way that we communicated, the way that even the moment where I saw Tyler put his harness back on. [01:22:05] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:22:06] Speaker E: I was like, obviously Tyler knows something that I haven't picked up on yet. So I also was in my gunner's belt. [01:22:14] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:22:15] Speaker E: And I put myself back in the seat and I was double strapped. And so it was just like, the crew. It couldn't have gone any better. I spent the entire week basically randomly texting Tyler and me, like, hey, do you remember this? Or what do you think about this? And just, like, processing every second for the entire week. [01:22:36] Speaker A: Dude, that's important. I've had cases with the same thing I keep. We text the aircrews, like, texting for the week after the case and, you know, going back and forth and being pumped about it and debriefing that. That's huge. That's very important. [01:22:48] Speaker E: Yeah. The dump after, like, I didn't realize just the magnitude of it all until a week later. Yeah. And I was still riding that high. [01:22:59] Speaker A: Nice. [01:23:00] Speaker E: And still trying to process every moment. But, yeah, it couldn't have gone any better. [01:23:07] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:23:07] Speaker E: And we kind of had a more perfect crew. Even, like, to the moment wherever I remember being hoisted up and those feelings of, wow, look at the view. But also panic. [01:23:20] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:23:21] Speaker E: Were starting. They were fighting with each other. [01:23:24] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:23:25] Speaker E: And I remember looking up at Tyler and him just, like, laser focused on me. [01:23:31] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:23:32] Speaker E: And as soon as he brought us up to the door, I was thinking, how am I going to get this person into the cabin? [01:23:38] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:23:38] Speaker E: Like, we were a little lopsided in a way that I just had no leverage, so I was 100% relying on Tyler to figure that out. [01:23:49] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:23:50] Speaker E: And, like, he just. He made it look so easy. He just. We came up to the door, he grabbed the hook and just yanked both of us. [01:23:57] Speaker A: Nice. [01:23:58] Speaker E: Inside. And I was like, did I just witness superhuman strength? [01:24:01] Speaker A: Like, probably actually, like, what is. [01:24:05] Speaker E: Was that adrenaline? You know, because I felt. I've never felt like such a dainty fairy in my life. [01:24:11] Speaker A: You know, there's a quote on the podcast right there. Right. [01:24:16] Speaker E: And he just, like, with one swoop of his strong flight mech arm, just took us both into the cabin. [01:24:25] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. [01:24:26] Speaker E: And just was like, do not worry. Like, you did your job, now let me do mine. Like, that's what. [01:24:32] Speaker A: Yeah, he's like, I got you, homie. [01:24:34] Speaker B: Dude. [01:24:34] Speaker E: Yeah, he was no more. No more stressed, you know? Dude, it was just perfect. [01:24:41] Speaker A: Yeah. Dude, that's awesome, man. I mean, it sounded like great crew composition. Joey also had a beard. That probably helped, but. Yeah, dude, I. Man, I am. I do love this job here at ATC, but I miss search and rescue. When we do these, I get. I get super jealous. [01:24:57] Speaker B: Yeah. I was on Google Maps and foreflight, guys, when you were telling your story on kind of where you got to the point Pfeiffer beach there and then, like, up the canyon. So I was trying to follow along play by play a little bit. And, man, what a beautiful aor. What a. What a unique place, but also very dangerous, you know what I mean? Especially with all the weather that's been going on. But that was a really awesome story to listen to. [01:25:23] Speaker A: Yeah. Thanks, guys. [01:25:25] Speaker D: Yeah, thanks for. Thanks for having us, man, and letting us. Let us talk to. Talk to you guys about it. And it's really awesome to kind of reunite with. With the crew like this. He said you missed our. I do, too, man. Being a hip. Yeah. [01:25:41] Speaker B: Ship helo headquarters, far removed from search and rescue, I imagine. Do you guys have any pictures that you'd like to share that we can put on our instagram and stuff like that? [01:25:54] Speaker D: We do. Had some bottom up photos. [01:26:00] Speaker B: Can't say bottom up on the podcast. Actually, you can. [01:26:07] Speaker D: But, yeah, I think. I think right before the first downdraft, I started to pull out my phone, decided not to do that? [01:26:15] Speaker A: Yeah, you're like, oh, it's great. Wait, no, no, no. [01:26:17] Speaker B: Shoot. [01:26:18] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. Send those if you guys are curious. Listen, we'll post those up on our social media platforms. But, hey, thanks again, guys. Really appreciate great storytelling. I'm pumped. I'm gonna go fly a helicopter right now. Hey, yeah, we'll see you down here. [01:26:37] Speaker D: Yeah. [01:26:37] Speaker A: All right. [01:26:38] Speaker B: Sweet. [01:26:39] Speaker A: Yeah. Thanks, guys. [01:26:40] Speaker B: Nice chatting, guys. [01:26:41] Speaker D: Yeah. See y'all. [01:26:41] Speaker A: See ya, bud. [01:26:43] Speaker B: Great. [01:26:43] Speaker A: Listen, dude, high altitude August, I guess, is what we're gonna call this month, man. Sounds like cases are picking up inland and at a high altitude. [01:26:53] Speaker B: Yeah, big time. I'm curious. You know, there's been more requests for inland stuff, right. And I know for this case, it was probably weather related, right? Because they did have, what, the two other helicopters and who knows what, they were either county helicopters or state, something like that. But they turned down the case. So maybe that says something about a hars, right. Advanced helicopter rescue school and the training that's put on there and benefiting our air crews so they can go out, execute these missions. Now, I've always kind of been in the mindset where units have the ability to provide a training program to their folks as well. But, yeah, maybe the advanced part is. Is really kind of crucial here, you know what I mean? Where you can kind of push the boundaries and discuss things a little bit more. [01:27:35] Speaker A: And that's what I think a hard provides is more supervision. You know, you have trained guys on skis, you have trained guys on cliffs, like on the radio. You have just more supervision to conduct that. But, yeah, it's good. But definitely, if you're not going a hars pedal should be to the metal to train in your fun. Aor. [01:27:52] Speaker B: Yep. [01:27:53] Speaker A: It's also fun, you know, like. [01:27:54] Speaker B: Exactly. [01:27:55] Speaker A: I do think we need to keep pushing, uh, pushing this program safely, but doing things that are a little out of the ordinary, because we are operating out of the ordinary. And, uh, you shouldn't have to see that for the first time, so. [01:28:07] Speaker B: Exactly. [01:28:07] Speaker A: And I think that crew swap is perfect. I flew with Joey, um, in San Francisco. He took me for a high altitude day, not super high altitude, but I was up in, like, some surrounding mountains and showed me, like, you know, upwind, downwind side. We did some cool landings. It was just like. And he's just very knowledgeable. And it's like, yep, that guy should have been in that helicopter. [01:28:23] Speaker B: Yeah, for sure. As hard as it may be to swap somebody out for a SAR case, you know, I think it does make sense, right? When you're trying to evaluate risk and gain. Who are the best qualified folks to go out and do the job? And I think that makes sense. Right. For the perspective of, like, the crew. [01:28:40] Speaker D: Right. [01:28:40] Speaker B: Crew safety. And then, of course, you know, the survivor safety or patient safety as well. Yeah, it makes sense. It just simply does. Hopefully, nobody would ever get upset about that. You know, as the crew member, I would. I would probably forfeit my chair, you know, if it made sense, and I would try not to take that personally. But one thing that's really impressive is just the folks, the crew remaining really flexible, you know what I mean? And making decisions as they see them. Right. So, like, hey, we're faced with this issue. Cool. Let's make a decision safely and let's continue moving forward. And I think that's one thing that we do really, really well, especially in a time constraint environment, is. Is being flexible and being able to shift gears. And sometimes without question, too. Right. When rushing swimmer goes down or is getting ready to go down and makes a game time decision. Hey, actually, I don't want to do a litter anymore. I'm going to take the quick strap, and we're going to do a direct with a. You know, basically, it would look like a sad poo recover, basically. [01:29:39] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:29:40] Speaker B: But I thought that was great, you. [01:29:41] Speaker C: Know what I mean? [01:29:41] Speaker B: And that's the kind of stuff you have to do sometimes in order to make it work. [01:29:45] Speaker A: Trust. Trust the other perspectives in the crew. If you've flown in each crew station in the 65, you realize you see different things. [01:29:52] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:29:53] Speaker A: Like, if you like sitting at the door during a hoist, you see, you know, the whole hoisting area. You see the people's faces that you're hoisting to. [01:30:00] Speaker B: Right. [01:30:00] Speaker A: You know, you don't see that in the front, in the right seat, and some folks might not think that you're picking something to hoist off of. I'm not looking at reactions of people. I'm looking at treetops to keep us away from trees while the rescue swimmers looking at actual people's reactions. So if they make a game time decision and it sounds now shouldn't sound absolutely crazy, but if it sounds like it works, go for it. [01:30:20] Speaker B: Right? Yeah. In this case, too. And one other thing that we're talking about was ambulatory versus non ambulatory, and I'll just share my personal thoughts on it. Ambulatory means basically, like, to keep it very elementary. You can move under your own power. [01:30:32] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:30:33] Speaker B: You know what I mean? Uh, non ambulatory. Maybe there's different parts. But you. You can't move under your own power or move well enough, you know what I mean? In which case you start thinking like, litter or basket, probably. Um, one thing that I thought was cool, uh, from a completely different case, it was a really good one. Uh, they hoisted an individual that was very injured off of a grain silo. Yeah, they did a direct with a double lift, so the sling and the quick strop around the patient. And what that did is kind of like cradle them, you know what I mean? So, like, not all the weight was supported by their, you know, underneath their arms and their torso. But I always thought, man, that's a great pickup if you don't have time for a litter or you don't have space for a litter, because it's somewhere in between doing a basket. [01:31:20] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:31:21] Speaker B: And doing, like, a litter or something like that. [01:31:23] Speaker A: There's no back injury or neck injury. You're just bringing a litter because somebody's non ambulatory. That seems like a great weight saving. [01:31:29] Speaker B: And, you know, as far as, like, what I've seen in riding, the only time you really need to use a litter and what the rescue swimmers are probably still trained on, if you suspect neck or back injury, then. Then you. I don't know if it's a should, but it's probably at least a very strong shell, right. You know, consider using the rescue litter. But if that's not the case, man, we got options. And I thought this was a great option for sure. [01:31:52] Speaker A: They crush it, man. I loved hearing that story. [01:31:54] Speaker B: Yeah, that was a good one. It makes me want to go to California. And I'm not gonna lie, I like the intro song. [01:31:59] Speaker A: The San Francisco song resumes doing ten days, you know? [01:32:03] Speaker B: I know. [01:32:04] Speaker A: Re racket. [01:32:04] Speaker B: Mmm. [01:32:05] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:32:05] Speaker B: If 711. Yeah, the detailers are listening out there. Not 711, but OPM. [01:32:10] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:32:10] Speaker B: One of the numbers one through four. Yeah, California would be sweet. [01:32:14] Speaker A: Yeah. Also, Max thinks California be sweet. [01:32:16] Speaker B: Okay. [01:32:16] Speaker A: But we could do the podcast there. [01:32:18] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Good deal. [01:32:20] Speaker A: All right. All right, we got more cases. Send them if you got them. Thanks for listening. Enjoy the weekend. Have a couple crispy boys. [01:32:26] Speaker B: See ya later. Will you die? [01:32:40] Speaker A: Cause you can't save every soul gotta take every chance to show that you're the kind of man who. I'll never look back, never look down. [01:32:54] Speaker B: I never let go.