Remote Canyoning Rescue in Taiwan: Pelvic Injury, Wilderness First Aid, and Helicopter Evacuation

What happened?

We were in a remote canyon, deep in the Taiwanese mountains, when my friend fell 8 meters and broke his pelvis. He fell hit a ledge side on, and bounced into the water entangle in rope and floating on his bag, he was crying for help, I dove into the water and dragged him out using rescue stroke,  ensuring his airway was kept above water at all times, I placed him on a small beach whilst I assessed him, my friend said it’s bad and he’s not walking out so I set off the rescueME PLB1 and swam it across the pool to a more open area where the rescueME PLB1 could transmit best.  I went back to my friend and started swimming him across the other side of the pool, to a bigger, drier beach.

He complained of a lot of pain around his right hip.  When we reached the end of the pool, he refused to let us move him out of the water and insisted on staying in the water in his wetsuit. I asked Friend-2 to help me get the tarp out of the bag, and we used it to lift Friend-1 out of the water. He was screaming in pain, but I didn’t want him to get hypothermia. Once out of the water,

Friend-2 started collecting firewood, and I started boiling water to get him hot water bottles. Hot water bottles were given to him. We then gave him Paracetamol, Ibuprofen.  

I bound his pelvis with a pelvic splint using a space blanket and a carabiner to tension the space blanket around his pelvis adequately.  I then bound his feet with a sling to hold his legs and pelvis together. Vital signs taken every 5-10 minutes initially were stable. As Friend-2 was sorting firewood and building a fire, I started cutting off his wetsuit with a canyoning knife, being careful not to move his legs. Once the wetsuit was off, Friend-2 and I pushed dry bags under his body, then put thermal layers on and a raincoat and rain pants, then I took off his shoes and wet socks and put on dry socks, then reapplied the foot wrapping.  

Friend-2 tried to walk up the ridge above us to get a phone signal but got to a section where there were impassable cliffs in many directions, so he returned to camp. We refilled his hot water bottles every few hours and kept the fire going with green leaves sitting close by to put on the fire if we heard a plane flying by to send a smoke signal. We prepared a foil blanket and a bright bothy bag to signal to a plane if they flew over. I planned to walk further downstream early the next day to get reception and call for help if there was nothing heard overnight. We made a rope stretcher and tried to move him onto it to get him high away from the water, but he was in too much pain and would not tolerate it.

We continued to keep him warm until the helicopter arrived.  I was taken out by winch at 6.30pm Friday. I thought they would take us all, but they did not have a Stokes litter, and it was dusk, so unfortunately, they flew away and rescued friend-1 and Friend-2 in the morning after a very long night trying to stay warm and alive.

Words of wisdom

Bring a fire starting kit, a pot to boil water, a few bottles you can put boiling water in that won’t deform, this can prevent hypothermia.

A few foil blankets are also great for creating a pelvic splint, and keeping you warm and signalling  helicopters.

Thank you note to the Ocean Signal team

Thank you for creating a product that sent out a distress signal within 10 minutes of it being activated.