Fighting Huge Waves - Rescue | Coast Guard Cape Disappointment Pacific Northwest | Full Episode

churning waters send coast guard rescue crews barreling across the sea when a fishing vessel calls for help holy crap they just got knocked out my heart sank i didn't know what was going to happen air station astoria scans the water for clues on the search for a missing kayaker the person had already been in the water 20 minutes so concerns about the victim being hypothermic we're certainly going through our minds and a training flight takes a sharp twist when the crew gets a call to save a fisherman with severe head injuries just make sure he's breathing when i heard that stress call my heart just automatically just started pumping there's a hf antenna that's sticking pretty high up there we're ready for you just lost a whole bunch of their gear off the side sir [Music] high peaks and tumultuous waters make cape disappointment and the pacific northwest one of the most hazardous environments in north america at the heart of it all is the columbia river bar this deadly area has taken countless vessels and claimed hundreds of lives in the air and on the sea brave men and women of the u.s coast guard risk their own safety so that others may live in a place known as the graveyard of the pacific [Music] all stations this is the united states coast guard sector columbia river at 2 36 local time the coast guard has received a report of an overturned kayak with 0-1 mail within mcnairy lake any vessel transiting the area is requested to keep a sharp lookout assist if possible and make any reports to this coast guard unit the tsar alarm just went off and we got a report of a kayak with two people in the water so apparently the sheriff's department called us and asked for assistance one kayaker was on the shore with the sheriff's and the other one still in the water so we set out as quick as we could to go find them [Music] go ahead down to that lake we'll get in there as quickly as you can see if you can train the poor guy back roger the person had already been in the water 20 minutes before we'd even launched so concerns about the victim being hypothermic were certainly going through our minds we were wanting to get out there in a hurry and hopefully find a person there in the water sector at the ground party does not have visual on the person the person is unaccounted for it is a white male adult in his 40s he was wearing a black jacket black jeans no life jacket been in the water for approximately 60 real minutes that lake is right off of the river come around to the right doctor from coast guard 6-0-3-5 round three we're doing a shoreline search so we'll keep it nice and slow we'll try to be thorough coming up the shoreline here roger right by where they flipped the area is fairly small so first we started off at the perimeter of the lake making the assumption that the person was trying to make it unsure maybe didn't quite make it there's something right there chris was on the infrared camera trying to look for any heat signatures on the shoreline we were all looking at the same side of the aircraft circling around the entire lake while the police were there on foot on the outside on the ground they had said that he was wearing a black jacket and jeans so there wasn't much color that was really going to stand out but basically just looking for anything on the surface of the water and anything moving on the sides what we're really looking for all right i'm going to go over to the other side and we'll do the same thing one more time on the other side you should check that little island piece there too pretty good huh there's something here it's kind of difficult to look through the trees and see if maybe he's there trying to stay warm if he hadn't already got out of the water all right well we searched all the shoreline unless i missed something guys i'm gonna circle that little strip of land here in the center definitely one of the bad parts with the water being so murky is that we just really can't penetrate below the surface a lot of times we can look just a few feet long maybe figure out some shadowing that's going on underwater maybe have an idea where somebody might be but that water was so brown and so dark that was really no way of seeing anything beyond the first inch or two of the surface every time i've looked for somebody in the water we ended up finding the person pretty much where the boat was pretty much right where he was last seen yeah so maybe we can just cover there and stir up the water one of the really effective tools that we have with the helicopter is the effects of the rotor wash so i'm assuming they tied off that life jacket right there at the point where it sank whatever that black thing is over here on the right-hand side you see that it looks like fabric to me we basically used the rotor wash just to kind of push on something to see what it did how it moved so we could kind of get a better picture of what it was yeah let's get these guys over here to check that out osp helicopter 6035 right next to where the life jacket is there appears to be some sort of black material in the water copy there's a life jacket and a black coat we left it out there's a marking all right now we get the slew over here to the left and for us to say we've saturated we probably should see this blue with a little inlet okay we'll check it we take every search and rescue case just as seriously as if we're going out to find one of our family members we were able to cover the entire lake about three times and thoroughly searched it like if we were looking for one of our our parents our kids or something and then right next to it chris what are you thinking right now i think we've searched everything we're going to search i don't think there's an alive person here therefore i think other assets are going to be great come find that how about you blair what do you got yeah i'm kind of feeling the same i don't know how far out further we want to go uh chris carter what do you think if there was a person who could actually assist right now we would have seen him in this fall area already yeah what do you think sir no i'm with you guys you know i wish we could do more i'm just hoping somebody is a got a better idea you said i wish there's more we can do i mean we've done everything on our capabilities it's just now they need a diver or something and look under the surface now it's a body search foreclosure everybody's like you know what i feel very confident that we've looked at this entire lake very thoroughly and uh you know it's time to go back to the air station and we knew there was other ground parties out there that were continuing to look but we felt certain that the person was either not in the lake at all or was or had drowned somewhere and was just not found here let's just slide this up one more time we'll close that sector it goes by like after 6035 we have heavily exaggerated the area at this point uh we have covered the entire lake probably a total of three times now high confidence that there's not a survivor in the trees or along the shoreline or certainly not in the water you guys are free to rgb 605 but roger that thank you the people in the kayak did not have life vests on typically if a person has a life vest we have a really good outcome and if they don't have a life vest normally we have a hard time finding them alive though oh yeah i know it sucks you know if it was my mom that's what i was trying to think of what would i do like we said i don't think as much as we can do from here when you sign up for this job a certain part of you just wants to help no matter what and when you go out to help somebody and you put that much effort and that much of your time and energy and just a part of you into that it's tough to return without the person you were looking for it takes a lot out of you we take this job very seriously and we always hope for the best outcome you ready for transition forward flying back gentlemen you can go ahead close the door they're growing a second v6 pump right now [Music] got a report of fishing vessel soviets taking on water 25 miles offshore [Music] stern's clear all right rig the deck for gear pass it's going to be a drogue i want the drogue in the 200 feet of line we tow across the bar on a flat day we can do that in our sleep when you change it up and you have to go get somebody in heavy weather everything changes like night and day there's no relaxing you're always stressed out you're constantly calling out a wave more people get sick underway six o'clock straight you're ready get ready get ready heavy weather training it brings in a piece of reality you start to understand what's going to affect you the seasickness the movement of the boat the wind send it even 10 knots of wind is going to affect everything you do cape disappointment is an area known for rough weather fast currents high winds and without constant training we're not going to be ready they're constantly being evaluated so that when we do get the big case in the middle of the night when it's blowing sideways and dark and you're not feeling well they're going to be able to complete the mission and get everybody home safe roger captain what's the nature of your stress i've taken on water i'm not sure where exactly from my battle pumps has been able to keep up roger that guy we're in the process of getting a motor lifeboat underway right now they're grabbing a second p6 pump right now got a report of fishing vessel silvia's taking a water the initial call was 25 miles offshore standby getting underway for a fishing vessel taking on water a bit more urgent for a case that's further offshore might be people in 40 to 50 degree water it can get pretty chilly if they don't have their survival suits on driving out to a 60-foot boat four people on board it's a wonderful northwest day raining blowing the call sounding pretty panicked so we try to get healed up just in case they sank pretty quick sylvia from station uquana bay are hilo's looking at a 15-minute eta over roger thank you sir gta 1 hour 45 minutes conditions are pretty rough blowing probably 25 to 30 miles an hour that's going to make the siege pretty choppy so it's not going to be a fun ride going basically directly into it [Music] what's that status negative unable to keep up with flooding when we're here the boat's taking on water it's pretty urgent i'm working the radio and making communications with the station in the boat and the helicopter that's out there oh it was a pretty crappy ride the combined scene was a little bigger than we were anticipating oh yeah it's on my face getting cultured in the face by the rain repeatedly is uh torturous just kind of keep your head down and try to see where you're going [Music] we're trying to get there as fast as we can with the wind blowing and the sea spray basically you just got to turn your head and take the water and see where you're going again and keep trucking there we go two four six six got a visual on a vessel with their sodium song station six six on scene uh windsor east about 20 [Music] we're gonna knots now you are in good hands thank you very much we got there was still a little bit of daylight the helo's already turned around to fly back a risk first game for them it wasn't you know worse the risk to do anything else especially is the 266. how are your uh phones keeping up so far if you want we can go ahead and send over uh one more pump all right go get the pump ready all right all right captain if you could uh come down we'll uh get this to toss it over there all right trying to work the deck it's pretty hard we're rocking and rolling now we're trying to get the pump across to to the boat all right ready passing the hume line over certainly having much stronger winds impacts your your throat [Music] made on the first shot was pretty happy about that especially given the wind and sea state we just sent over a p6 pump right now we're holding right next to them while they uh set it up swell's picked up a bit now that we've gotten offshore maybe six foot swell every once in a while station two six six standing by to see if they get our pump started we just sent over a p6 pump right now we're holding right next to them while they uh set it up got a report of fishing vessel sylvia's taking on water 25 miles offshore 22 22.6 miles this is gonna be a long drive home yeah now we got pumps on the boat where i started the de-ordering process so we got a long way to go it's gonna be a real slow ride have you ever seen a boat with a lot of water in it what happens is all that water goes to one side and that boat will roll up and sit there and it'll all go back and then it'll just go over super super dangerous [Music] as we come within about 15 miles of the entrance buoy the vessel is taking on water at a faster rate their pumps are not able to keep up with it they're not able to use the pump that we have given them okay plan is you're going to go over there and assess the water on the boat if you need another pump we'll send you another pump the boats are gonna be rocking and rolling so i'm gonna get you up alongside close enough so you can get over there and it becomes necessary that we have to jump onto the other vessel and get that pump going there we go [Music] we got on board with the silvia and they're glad to see us we kind of brought a calming over the boat i think this is the hold right all you have is just the fish hole yeah yeah all right you want it down there now [Music] i was going to keep a good eye on that boat oh we got our guys over here take care of our people all right sylvia six six we'll keep on this course for a minute and see how the flooding goes at some point we'll have to make another course change to start making our way back towards the entrance to you there roger it's just the absolute worst course to steer especially with uh you know water in the boat we gotta get these guys to go north give me a course with the swell direction how it was and how unstable that boat was the wrong course could have potentially rolled that boat over so this 266 what do you think about heading directly into it do you think that would make a better ride maybe a little more stable yeah so we got to pick the right course just to get back to the entrance find the entrance boy yeah it's right by the that lighthouse all right i want you to keep an eye on that for me we're so close four and a half miles this is where it's gonna get tricky we're getting pretty close to uh home now but it's we're not really out of the woods yet we gotta get across the bar sylvia what are your thoughts on uh crossing the bar i'm not soaked on it this is my first trip i got water in my building i think as far as the bar goes it'll probably be pretty much what we see here super super dangerous awesome any minute a set of waves can come in and next thing you know the boat capsizes silvia's the 6-6 how are we doing roger we're just a couple hundred yards from uh getting between the tips here as we cross the entrance waves die down it becomes flat we're assessing where to tie the vessel up and while we are now keeping up with the flooding it's still flooding and there's still holes somewhere along the bottom of the boat later on they'll have divers go down below underneath the vessel and patch it up sylvia's puffed people in the dark to open lines this was a really long case we did about four knots from 25 miles out [Music] of the dock garage will be tying up at 4.3 we escort them all the way in and we're talking about where we can get them tied up so they can continue their dewatering efforts certainly have a lot of respect for fishermen they're going out for multiple days at a time they're working extremely long hours with little sleep it's nice to know that we're able to assist them if they ever start to have any troubles at a seat surely our rescue helicopter just like to find out your crew member is still having seizures over we were in a training flight and received a call that uh the fishing vessel surely are had a crew member that had struck his head and went into seizures there's a hf antenna that's sticking pretty high up there yeah i see that's probably about 60 feet easy forward right they just lost a whole bunch of their gear off the side sir [Music] vessel free first and then we'll do the holy spirit we're currently over the mouth of columbia river training with station cape disappointment i haven't hoisted at night uh since december so i'm really excited to go out and just kind of knock some of the rest off and get that done ready for one trail line delivery to basket recovery to the 47 footer underway [Music] it was about 15 minutes before sunset we were about to begin hoist training when we heard that we would possibly need to execute a medevac so there's a boat 20 miles off grey's harbor someone fell and hit their head and they are in a seizure roger so they are diverting us there now roger and commander if you can turn north to make the best speed [Music] immediately upon notification of the star case the crew came up with a plan we had a rescue swimmer on board it was his first case brian rodriguez so he was also involved from the medical aspect i'm going to call your grace harper see what they can tell him brian what sort of questions do you have about the seizure first thing i want to make sure is easy breathing to make sure he's breathing he's irresponsive and after that how long the teachers were when i heard that distress call i was just like whoa you know my heart just automatically just started pumping i was just thinking of what could i do all these questions started running through my head was he able to talk you know was he laying down was he standing up could he walk okay there's a target a boat at two o'clock looks like potentially our guy fishing vessels surely our favorite vessel surely are this is the coast guard rescue helicopter 6029 channel 2 2 over here we are good evening captain we have you on radar and uh we should be there shortly as we're getting on scene what we call pinky time nautical twilight when the the sun is below the horizon but it's still that that dusk sort of condition so we're looking at things becoming more difficult as it's dark just because you have less visual reference and you can't pick up your drifted movement it has to be this guy off the nose surely our rescue helicopter just like to find out if your uh if your crew member is still having seizures over no i was saying he's out of the seizure uh but he doesn't know what happened okay every person can walk and get in the basket obviously that's pretty straightforward if there's any uh neck injuries by no injury or the person can't walk then we would need to put a rescue swimmer down and employ a litter for the person to be strapped down can you give us any information on spinal injuries or neck injuries the other person walks to a basket he said that all his muscles are fine he is mobile and the other two guys can assist if you need it okay that's great information uh stand by one [Music] okay brian with that updated information what do you think if the guy's walking around throw them in the basket the only thing i'm wary of is if this guy did have a seizure like being hoisted is pretty dramatic it's my fear that the guy's gonna have a seizure while he's being hoisted but i think that litter's best but brian should definitely make the decision sir okay brian what are your thoughts i think i would feel more comfortable just getting down and uh but i'll check on i'll make sure if he's good and i'll just stand on the basket okay our goal with the first choice was to put brian down on the back deck of the boat so he could evaluate that patient and figure out exactly what kind of uh device we needed to pick him up check over roger you take a swimmer from the coaster helicopter we're gonna make an approach to the stern of your vessel we're ready for you sitting at that door you know i was like this is not training anymore it's legit and i was just thinking to myself slow smooth smooth as fast you know there's a hf antenna that's sticking pretty high up there yeah i see that's probably about 60 feet it should be out of the rotor disc but if you want to do a little bit higher of a hoist maybe like a 60 foot hoist 60 foot would probably be good sir okay okay target is at two o'clock you can begin the hoist going down easy forward right he just lost a whole bunch of their gear off the side sir bumper first about ten feet off the back that's a vessel hold i got on the boat it was a smooth delivery disconnected and i made my way to the wheelhouse i made contact with the survivor and uh anything i was looking for is just that he was aware i checked the survivor's breathing i checked his pulse i also was making sure he was able to move he didn't damage any part of his cervical collar [Music] he said he tripped over hit his head and had a big laceration to the left side of his of his head they had a way to stop the bleeding but it wasn't really that sterile it looked like it was a rag or a sock i couldn't really tell search ready for pickup parachute load takes load faster that's halfway up [Music] fastest coat inside [Music] we decided at that point we should just disconnect the hoist hook from the basket send it straight back down without briefing which expedited our pickup of brian the patient did have a head injury could possibly have a concussion he was seizing and we wanted to expedite getting brian to him just in case anything happened in the back of the plane because if i'm in the middle of a hoist and something happens to him i can't help him because i have to worry about my swimmer door's going up [Music] first just blows while i was being hoisted up i just kept thinking you know i gotta get up there and just continue on treating him making sure he's stable how's he doing back there giving him to right now he has a severe laceration out of his uh his head so i think he felt pretty hard while i removed the gauze i seen a large laceration to the left side of his head look big like he's going to need some stitches on there and i just try to keep it clean they were using a socks to stop the bleeding okay we'll be on deck in two minutes brian replaced the bandage on the injured crew member he was bleeding profusely from the head but was able to stabilize him and he seemed to be in good condition as we transited for approach when we landed at hokum airport i grabbed the survivor and escorted him to ems and he said thank you you know thank you for helping me out which is a pretty awesome feeling you know to help somebody out man i'm so glad i'm not a fisherman i concur my name is james todd male i'm a fisherman from the surety r we were out there halibut fishing 48 hours straight i'm on one side baiting hooks my whole left side seized up i fell cracked my head and then i blacked out my boys that i worked with my crew members wrapped my head and then that's when they called up the coast guard [Music] they did an exceptional job it was kind of it was exhilarating in the pacific northwest when you're out there on the ocean the only thing that you got going for yourself is the coast guard they really look out for not just me not just anyone but [Music] everyone today my biggest concerns are the boat coming in it's not designed to operate in in big seas it's not designed to operate in breaking waves like our boats are oh jesus [Music] here it comes [Music] horse clear all right clear two all right coming up again hi we've been monitoring the fishing vessel all day uh the fishing vessels still the 57 foot four people on board anticipating coming in across a pretty rough bar we've been keeping an eye on the conditions and uh we think it may be favorable for him to sneak inside before the egg kicks in and keeps them stuck offshore overnight look at that wow right now we have two motor light boats 52 foot motor lifeboat victory back there and uh we're the 47268 the victory will push outside and escort the vessel in behind him we'll remain inside the tips holding position center channel to give the boat something to steer on we get the call from fishing vessel sylvia that his intentions are to come across the aquina bay bar it's the same vessel that pretty recently we helped assist when she was taking on water it was just around high tide which means that we would expect that the ab would start with the force of the water running out through the river meeting the power coming in from the pacific ocean generally uh creates your worst conditions that you experience so yep looks like this is the series [Music] today i'll be on the lifeboat 47268 and i am the surfman of that boat a surfman is the highest qualification that you can achieve as a small boat boat driver it means that the command and people around you have confidence that you can make good decisions while driving a boat you can also drive the boats to its limitations when we have these really big days or when we have these 18 to 20 foot seas i always get a little butterflies it's a mix between excitement and nervousness today my biggest concerns are the boat coming in it's not designed to operate in in big seas it's not designed to operate in breaking waves like our boats are port side i got it all right thank you good job coming in asia you got a stern that's gonna be big 25 yards the conditions are crappy about 12 to 14 foot seas you know we're sitting in there we're bobbing and we're taking a few breaks coming into the channels and that's another thing that we do we ate in breaking down those waves you know if the boat comes at the tips you know we can turn around and break down that wave so that that boat can make it in without you know flopping to one of the jetties of the side so you know kind of like a bodyguard we kind of sit in the middle of the channel we guard the body of water or the boat to come in that is big oh there they go up here just rolled underneath you all right dude that break was a mile wide dude it was ridiculous we got on scene right as we got there this big series rolls through um probably 14 to 16 foot we stopped right at the jetty tips we had two boats on scene so my job was to stay inside the jetty tips and if something happened i could go out also i was going to stay center channel that way the fishing vessel had something to steer on sometimes the wave picks them up and puts them down it's hard to see the range and the jetties in the bigger swells but you can see the top of our antenna and things like that [Music] no it's not outside right there [Music] [Laughter] let [Music] the conditions at the time were 16 to 18 foot long rolling swell occasional break across the jetty tips we made the determination that before the sylvia came in i was going to cross the bar at their max speed a couple times to make sure i was all right with them uh crossing want to drive for a minute [Music] yeah all right we're arriving at the jetty tips and it's very humbling the seas are ginormous it's breaking uh 16 to 18 foot looking at a vessel like the fishing vessel sylvia we're thinking oh my goodness he better be on top of his game today it was [Music] [Applause] [Music] oh i see the lifeboat as it comes around and just gets enveloped in a wall of white and my my heart sank i didn't know what was going to happen [Music] all right sylvia's inbound oh jesus here it comes we received a call on the radio from the fishing vessel sylvia who was stuck out in the storm i see the lifeboat as it comes around and just gets enveloped in a wall of white my my heart sank i didn't know what was gonna happen [Music] it's definitely scary to see the victory disappear it was nasty looking at white water and then not seeing the victory and then not seeing the sylvia and you have those moments of you know quietness on the radio victory 6-8 are you guys okay over watch it watch the sylvia washington [Music] almost inside tips just took a break on the quarter got him a little squirrely good years [Music] transmission came in over the radio really really muffled uh you can tell that the the victory had water in their microphone from the wave victory 6-8 can't understand you watering the mic over we did make out we're okay we're fine so immediately we get eyes on the fishing vessel sylvia we're watching them cecilia six eight victory looks like you got another series coming in on the bowie line dumping grounds right now we're comforting the victory because the victory does not know where they're at at the time they know that what hit them is coming for the sylvia next watch them asia sylvia six eight looks like you got another series coming in on the buoy lines right now [Music] we just had a series roll through that was a bigger series and we told the silvia that it was a good time to go we should have about eight minutes so they started in and probably the biggest series we saw all day came rolling underneath it came a little early and it was a little bigger come on the victory squared up and and took a good size swell and the silvia then had probably a 14 to 16 foot break if not maybe even a little bigger just engulf it on the stern somehow it just hit perfectly on the stern of the boat and the white water rushed down both sides of the boat and kept it going in a straight line how that happened i have no idea but somehow they got through it stationed in corner bay 6a fishing vessel sylvia and victory are inside tips over so much the season we encounter out here in the quina bay bar just something as simple as exiting the bar and coming back into the bar are very very difficult at times even for us the helmsman on the silvia had to have been on top of his game must have had an immense amount of experience here on the ukuina bay bar and operating his vessel and it speaks volumes for how the evolution went golly they got hit hard well that makes sunny a little more fun it's always a great feeling once everyone's safely inside because you know that your job's done you know that you got the number one goal of everyone coming back safely it was accomplished and and then you could go and prepare for the next mission i'm matthew knacken my vessel's the fishing vessel sylvia we were on our way in with about 20 000 pounds of hag fish on at the time we knew that there was a storm offshore generating a big swell that was coming in so for us it was a matter of staying out there enduring another 18 hours of inclement weather or get in the whole time you're driving in you're watching and you see it and feel it building and you start getting a little nervous [Music] [Applause] if you're in a taller boat with a wheelhouse you can sit up and you can actually time the sets and gives you a little sense of when you can go and when you can't and that was the primary reason we needed assistance from the coast guard because we're so low that you can't see and so having them figure out the timing in between the sets of breakers was what allowed us to get in with them there on site you feel safe enough to make the crossing you know that if things do go south they're there ready to respond thanks guys zucchini coast guard i've got my bacon saved by him a few times so yeah you got to respect the guys that come bail you out when things get heavy you know always tipping my hat to these guys they provide us with a sense of security

Channel: DangerTV

Views: 705,790

Keywords: coast guard cape disappointment, coast guard cape disappointment pacific northwest, coast guard cape disappointment pacific northwest season 1 episode 11, coast guard cape disappointment full episodes, coast guard pnw, coast guard pnw - cape disappointment pacific northwest, us coast guard, us coast guard cape disappointment, united states coast guard, united states coast guard cape disappointment, dangertv, danger, dangertv coast guard series, danger tv, Danger, DangerTV, Danger TV

Id: 8_rjlKJRFIE

Length: 42min 33sec (2553 seconds)

Published: Sat Sep 19 2020