Montrose Fire Civilian Extraction 2016

At 1250 hours, as the Geronimo IHC began accessing the Montrose Fire, one of their leadership, “Geronimo 1”, initiated a call to the Montrose IC of a civilian in the fire area who needed medical assistance. They clearly articulated that they would begin a 9 Line assessment of the patient. Ten minutes later, Geronimo 1 relayed that the patient was complaining of dehydration, had been in the woods for three days, and was “banged up”. At this point, incident overhead began discussing options. Involved in the conversation was a Pima County Deputy who was assisting Batt 55 throughout the fire. Resources on the fire included H-320, which is a fully qualified USFS Short-Haul capable helicopter. As more options were discussed on how to resolve the civilian medical issue, it became increasingly clear that the safest option—with the least amount of exposure (from a time lag/training/experience standpoint)— would be to utilize the Pima County Sheriff’s helicopter to conduct a hoist of the civilian.

Helicopters, Initial Attack, Aviation, RLS, Medevac, Medical or Exertion