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Seamless handover leads to successful river rescue

Just after 7pm on 23 April 2021, New Zealand’s Rescue Coordination Centre (RCCNZ) received an alert from a personal locator beacon near Arthur’s Pass. Search and Rescue Officer Julian Tovey started coordinating a response beginning with contacting the beacon’s registered owner.

Pfeiffer Biv Andrew Tyrell South Arrow Maps

That initial phone call yielded vital information: the owner confirmed he had lent the beacon to a group of three men tramping into Pfeifer Bivvy in Arthur’s Pass National Park.

However, the GPS coordinates from the beacon placed the men in the Deception River valley, several kilometres southwest of their intended destination.

After an RCCNZ shift change, Senior Search and Rescue Officer Conrad Reynecke took over the coordination and contacted the West Coast ROA Mining Rescue Helicopter. With the beacon coordinates giving a clear position, it should have been a straightforward rescue – however the weather had other ideas. Twenty minutes after leaving base, the rescue helicopter had to turn around due to weather conditions in the area.

“While it’s frustrating to have the chopper within minutes of people needing rescue, safety has to be the priority,” says Conrad. “We will always defer to the pilot’s assessment of the conditions.”

Conrad then initiated a discussion in the operations room at RCCNZ about the next steps for the rescue. Because the search was triggered by a beacon, it had automatically been classed as a Category 2 response with RCCNZ coordinating. However, with the helicopter unable to assist, a decision was needed about whether RCCNZ should retain coordination – utilising local police as the On Scene Coordinator – or if the whole operation should be handed over to police and transferred to a Category 1 operation.

Rescue map

Conrad says it was a straightforward decision to transfer the whole operation to police as a Category 1.

“With the helicopter unable to help, there was nothing we could really do to assist,” says Conrad.

“The local police were well placed to appoint an Incident Commander, establish an Incident Management Team, and mobilise ground crews.”

With the decision made, RCCNZ then formally handed over the operation to Senior Sergeant Mark Kirkwood of the Tasman Police District. Location information was still being received from the beacon and continued to be monitored by RCCNZ with Mark receiving regular updates.

Mark had already been briefed on the evolving situation and as a precaution, had mobilised the LandSAR groups from Hokitika and Greymouth by the time the call came through at 8.37pm that the helicopter was returning to base.

“Given the weather at the time, it seemed prudent to organise a field team just in case,” Mark says.

“The LandSAR groups from Hokitika and Greymouth are very experienced and were familiar with the area.”

Mark assumed the role of Incident Commander and placed an On Scene Coordinator at the road end on State Highway 73, near Jacksons, a small settlement in Westland.

“Straight away we established that the river levels were high,” says Mark.

“The team were encouraged to do their own risk assessment and were reminded that they could turn back any time if they felt the conditions were too unsafe to continue.”

The team of six LandSAR volunteers started making their way up the Deception River at 10.30pm. Keeping in touch with Mark using a Garmin InReach satellite messenger device, they reported swollen rivers, rain falling, and an ambient air temperature of -4 degrees.

Using the information provided from the team, Mark was able to contact the families of the three men with regular updates on the rescuers’ progress.

At 2.30am, the rescue team came across the three men, who had set up camp on the riverbed around six kilometres from the road end. They were pleased to find the group hadn’t moved since setting off their beacon.

“One of the men had been showing signs of hypothermia, but his mates had put him in a sleeping bag, so he wasn’t in immediate danger,” says Mark.

“The LandSAR team got a fire going, made hot drinks and then set up camp for the night.”

At first light, with the weather clear enough for a helicopter, the three men and the rescue team were retrieved from the riverbed by the West Coast ROA Mining Rescue Helicopter.

The reason for the beacon activation was quickly uncovered by talking with the men afterwards. The weather conditions had meant their original destination of Pfeifer Bivvy was unachievable, so they’d changed plans to head for Upper Deception Hut. However, upstream travel was slower than expected and with one of the group hypothermic, they set off their beacon.

“They did all the right things,” says Mark.

“They realised that the weather was closing in and one of their party needed help. They stayed put after setting off the beacon, so no additional searching was required.”

From RCCNZ’s point of view, it was a no-brainer to hand over coordination to enable a successful rescue.

“We’re all part of the same system, and in this instance the system worked brilliantly,” Conrad says.

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This story was originally published in issue 56 of Link magazine (September 2021)

Featured image: The West Coast ROA Mining Rescue Helicopter arriving on scene. Image courtesy of Ian Selwood, Greymouth LandSAR

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