Casey's Walk-about

One morning, Casey decided to go for a hike...36 hours later he was life flighted off the side of Pine Valley Mountain...Casey went for a hike before he was scheduled to pick me up from the airport flying home from San Diego. When he was late picking me up from the airport and didn't return my emails, I knew there was a problem. My boss and dear friend, Stuart Breinholt came and picked me up and we drove up to the trail head where we found Casey's car. After getting an email from Casey telling me he was fine, but lost and out of water and the battery on his phone was dying (not a good situation in St. George in July), we called the sheriff who in turn called search and rescue. They headed out around 10 pm which was about 15 hours after Case had started his hike. The next morning Casey was finally able to get a call out to 911 when he saw the S&R helicopter flying over head. (He had been have a problem with his signal) Luckily, Washington County has a service where they can track the GPS in your phone if you call. Even with the S&R hikers only being 1/2 a mile from where Casey was it took them over 2 hours to get him because the terrain was so bad. The helicopter was dropping water bottles to him but they were exploding on impact. The helicopter they were using didn't have a powerful enough engine to land in the winds and get stabilized and back out safely. So they had to fly a helicopter up from Page, Arizona.

I must say, I remained pretty dang calm through all this. Mostly through the help of two of my most favorite people, Liisa Frei and Stuart Breinholt. The reception was not great up on the mountain, so S&R had me come home so that if Casey called it would be able to get through. (He did call a couple of times but they kept dropping. It at least let me know he was still alright.) Stuart, and Liisa and Nick stayed up on the mountain to pass on any news to me. Then they came with me to the hospital. Thank goodness for their support.

By the time the helicopter got Casey to the hospital he had been out of water for 24 hours and because of the enzymes his muscles were releasing his kidneys were shutting down. He had to stay in the hospital over night while they had to IV's going with fluids. It was a pretty intense 2 days. Which ended up on the front page of the local paper. (Pretty sure Casey would rather have not been found then have it end up in the paper). So glad to have him home and safe!!!!