www.rmru.org/1987-014.htm -
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Published on: 5/11/1987
Last Visited: 3/15/2007
Dr. Hussey did another medical evaluation, started to hydrate Ray and called for the Oregon spine splint (which had been recently been donated to RMRU by doctors Mellor, Hussey, and Blaschko).
While Rob and Dr. Hussey packaged Ray, into the stoke litter, and set the litter rigging, the other team members were flown to the site and set-up the M.A. system in preparation for the raise.
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Ray would be flown out of the canyon and then transported to the hospital.
There was so little space where Dr. Hussey and Rob worked that no others could come down to help, in fact, the foot of the stokes litter had to hang over the waterfall below them.
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The raise was done with some difficulty, but as soon as Ray was at the top of the raise the helicopter was called back by radio and made perfect timing to Fly Ray out of the canyon.A few hours had gone by from mission start to getting Ray out of the mountain.In this instance, use of the helicopter mad a great savings of time.Without the helicopter Ray would not have been off the mountain for at least twenty-four hours.
RMRU cleaned up the gear and was flown back to base camp, where they had dinner together and then rode off in different directions each RMRU member returning to his family.