Tech Rescue Team

When the photos below first made the rounds on Social Media Saturday, many responders wondered what the correct course of action should be to rescue the trapped pilot. Here’s the answer, get your Tech Rescue Team there!

A plane crashed into the trees near the Gettysburg Regional Airport Saturday afternoon. The pilot, an 87-year-old local man, was not injured. The pilot experienced an engine failure and tried to return to the airport.  The plane ended up in the trees about 50 feet off the ground. The man called police after the crash from his cell phone. The single-engine plane faced nose-down for about four hours while rescue officials figured out how to free the pilot, Shank said. The plane was in a stable setting and the pilot was alert, so there was no rush to get him out, he said.

“He was in very good spirits the whole time there,” he said. “He was conscious, alert and oriented the whole incident, which lasted almost four hours. I think by the end, he was a little anxious to get out, as we all were to get him out of the situation he was in.”

Police, who arrived on scene around 12:30 p.m., originally thought they would use a Maryland State Police helicopter to fly above the plane and send a man down with a cable to get the pilot out, Shank said. However, the wind from the helicopter could have made the plane too unstable, so they decided otherwise, he said.

Frederick County Advanced Technical Rescue, assisted by crews in York and Adams counties, used ladders to climb from the ground to the plane, Shank said. After cutting branches from around the plane down, rescue workers put the man in a sling and lowered him to the ground, he said.  Read the complete story here: The Evening Sun

Photo Credit: Harrison Jones for the Evening Sun

Photo Credit: Harrison Jones for the Evening Sun