JOINT BASE ELMENDORF-RICHARDSON, Alaska - Airmen with the Alaska Air National Guard’s 210th and 212th Rescue Squadrons rescued three people in Cook Inlet on Sept. 11.
The three were stranded on a sandbar in the mud flats about six miles southeast of Fire Island.
The Alaska Rescue Coordination Center received a call from the Anchorage Fire Department at 9:05 a.m., requesting assistance to rescue occupants of a small vessel near Fire Island. The boat was taking on water and had begun to sink.
An HH-60 Pave Hawk from the 210th Rescue Squadron, with a Guardian Angel team (pararescuemen) from the 212th Rescue Squadron on board immediately responded. They spotted the three survivors in their small Jetcraft boat stranded on the mud flats, several miles from dry land.
During the quick, outgoing tide, the boaters began by taking on water with a real possibility of sinking, to being stranded on the mudflats with no way to evacuate on their own.
The Air National Guard’s rescue team hoisted the three survivors into the Pave Hawk and transported them to Providence Alaska Medical Center in Anchorage at 9:54 a.m., where they were released for medical evaluation.