Securing a stokes basket to the vessel...

[BladesRobinson]

I WONDER HOW MANY MIGHT PUT A VICTIM ON A BACKBOARD, PLACE THEM IN A STOKES BASKET, THEN SECURE THE BASKET TO THE BOAT FOR A QUICK TRANSPORT BACK ACROSS A RIVER. FOR SOME, THIS IS A REASONABLE COURSE OF ACTION .... UNTIL YOU READ THE FOLLOWING...

BE SAFE!

BLADES

.............................................................​

Woman dies when rescue boat sinks

August 23, 2006
By Susan Smallheer <mailto:susan.smallheer@rutlandherald.com> Herald Staff

SPRINGFIELD &#8212; The rescue of an injured woman from the banks of the Connecticut River turned tragic Tuesday when the rescue boat that retrieved her sank while she was still strapped into an emergency litter.

The woman, a 65-year-old Rockingham resident, was eventually brought to shore and emergency medical personnel performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation, but eyewitnesses said she had been trapped for more than an hour underwater.

Members of the Cornish, N.H. rescue crew, who had gone to pick her up at a private Springfield dock about a half mile south of Hoyt's Landing, also were dumped into the river, but they were not injured.

Hoyt's Landing, located at the confluence of the Connecticut and Black rivers, was filled with rescue personnel, dive teams and boats from both Vermont and New Hampshire, and a rescue helicopter was on standby. But the mood grew somber when rescuers carrying the woman took her to the Charlestown, N.H., ambulance. The ambulance never moved.

Vermont State Police Capt. Kevin Anderson said the woman was either trapped under the boat, which belonged to the Cornish, N.H. Rescue squad, or tied to the boat. He said five or six emergency personnel were on the boat with her.

Authorities at the scene said the rescue crew included people from Springfield and Cornish.

Anderson said the rescue boat was on its way back to Hoyt's Landing when it tipped over in the river. Because New Hampshire owns the river to the high water mark on the Vermont side, her death is being investigated by New Hampshire police authorities, Anderson said.

Charlestown, N.H., Fire Chief Gary Stoddard, joined by Vermont State Police Lt. Jocelyn Stohl, gave a brief statement about an hour after the woman was brought to shore, referring all other comments to the New Hampshire Marine Patrol and the New Hampshire Fish and Game Department. Representatives from both departments arrived at the scene later.

Edgar Emerson of Bellows Falls, who was with the woman when she was injured, said they were on their way to visit friends when she slipped getting out of his pontoon boat and onto the dock.

"She lost her balance and fell," Emerson said. He said she had cuts and bruises on her head and arms, and may have broken her ankle. "I told her she was going to be OK," Emerson said.

Emerson said he made sure she was sitting on shore before he took his boat to look for help. He said he steered his boat up to Hoyt's Landing to find a cell phone and call friends. But others insisted he call 911.

"She didn't want to go in the ambulance, she didn't want to be rescued," Emerson said Tuesday evening as darkness fell. Emerson, who said he didn't want to give his friend's name until her family had been notified, said she lived in North Shore Trailer Park, which is located on Missing Link Road in Rockingham.

He said he waited at Hoyt's Landing, then took two emergency medical technicians to provide the woman with first aid. He said her injuries prevented her from walking up the 100-plus steps from the river to a friend's home.

Shirley Latterell of Perkinsville, who was fishing for walleye and pike at Hoyt's Landing, called 911 for Emerson. She was the only one at Hoyt's Landing whose cell phone had service.

Latterell said the Cornish rescue boat, which she described as an airboat, had gone down the river to retrieve the injured woman. It tipped over and sank on its way back to the landing, she said.

Latterell said Emerson told her that his friend had been cut badly in her fall, and that she had slipped and fallen trying to get onto a dock. She said Emerson told her there was a possibility she had broken her ankle.

"He said she didn't want to go by ambulance and he called friends to tell them she was hurt, but not seriously," Latterell said.

Latterell said she convinced Emerson to call 911 because his friend was cut and bleeding, and she might go into shock.

"I dialed 911 and everything went haywire after that," Latterell said.

Some of the people at the boat landing who watched the incident speculated that the Cornish crew was in such a hurry to get on the water that it forgot to place the drainage plug in the boat before taking off. But one ambulance crew member from another town said that wasn't the case. Without a drainage plug in place, the boat would have sunk well before it had even reached the woman, the crew member said.

"It's just a horrible, horrible accident," the crew member said.

Stoddard said his department received the call for help at 4:30 p.m. It was 7 p.m. before the woman's body was brought to shore.

After the woman was pronounced dead, the rescue crews and divers turned their attention to the sunken boat. Shortly after 9 p.m., crews were towing the Cornish boat back to the Springfield landing. The Cornish rescue crew left with an empty boat trailer.

 

[BladesRobinson]

N.H. considers criminal probe into river death

August 24, 2006
By Susan Smallheer <mailto:susan.smallheer@rutlandherald.com> Herald Staff

SPRINGFIELD - New Hampshire officials said Wednesday they have launched what could turn into a criminal investigation into the drowning death of a Rockingham woman whose rescue on the Connecticut River turned fatal.

Meanwhile, family members of Virginia "Ginny" Allbee Yates, 64, said they would not let their mother's death be ignored, and said the family was exploring the option of hiring an attorney.

Yates' close childhood friend and "adopted sister," Sandra Santaw of Cornish, N.H., said her friend was a wonderful, loving person, adding that her death was "horrible" to many.

Santaw, who had known Yates since they were both 14, said that the Cornish Rescue Squad had refused to answer the family's questions and told Yates' brother to contact the attorney.

"This is not going to go away. Trust me, my sister's death won't be swept under the rug," Santaw said. "Ginny knew how to swim. Why was she strapped in? Why? For a sprained ankle and a cut on the head?"

Marc Hathaway, Sullivan County (N.H.) attorney, the county's criminal prosecutor, said Wednesday during a news conference at Hoyt's Landing, the local boat landing where Tuesday's rescue operation was launched, that the investigation by Vermont and New Hampshire authorities would be open-ended and it was possible that Yates' death could involve criminal charges.

"Any time you do an investigation, until you get all the facts, I've learned not to form an opinion," Hathaway said, when questioned about a possible criminal investigation.

Hathaway said he had "absolute faith" in the work of the New Hampshire Marine Patrol to investigate the particularly sensitive tragedy, which involved other public safety officials and volunteers.

Hathaway said six different agencies across the Vermont-New Hampshire state line would participate in the investigation.

Yates had received what family members said was a "minor" cut on the head and had sprained her ankle while on a private Springfield dock on the shore of the Connecticut River, about a half-mile south of Hoyt's Landing.

She was being transported to an ambulance by water because steep banks at that portion of the river made access difficult.

The Connecticut River is broad and seemingly calm at the location between Springfield and Charlestown, N.H., but there are strong currents in part due to the entrance of the Black River. The death is being investigated by New Hampshire because the state boundary is at the Vermont shore.

Yates, the mother of three surviving grown children, was a retired cook who had worked at several area diners and restaurants, including the Sportsman Lounge in Brattleboro and the Miss Bellows Falls Diner. She was a lifelong resident of the Rockingham-Westminster area, and was living on Social Security at the North Shore Trailer Park.

During the rescue, she was strapped onto a backboard, which in turn was harnessed to a Stokes basket, which was tied to the Cornish (N.H.) Rescue Squad boat, according to Sgt. Eric Robertson of the New Hampshire Fish and Game Department.

Hathaway refused to identify the so-called airboat, how old it was or what kind of training the Cornish Rescue Squad had received with the flat-bottomed boat. But news accounts said the squad had received the so-called fan or air boat in March and had done some training with it on the Connecticut River.

Robert Drye, president of the Cornish Rescue Squad, declined to comment on the incident, referring all comments to Hathaway.

Hathaway refused to say whether rescue squad members had put a life jacket on Yates, or whether they were wearing life jackets when the boat sank. Hathaway did say that four rescuers were on the boat when it sank, three members from Cornish and one from the Springfield Fire Department.

Springfield Fire Chief Russell Thompson couldn't be reached for comment Wednesday about Tuesday's accident. But Town Manager Robert Forguites said the members of the department were upset following the incident, and stress counseling had been offered to the department members.

Forguites said he did not know which Springfield firefighter/EMT was aboard the boat.

Christopher Aldrich of Claremont, N.H., Yates' son, said he had been told his mother wasn't wearing a life vest, although her rescuers were. Aldrich also said his mother had been strapped to the front of the boat, which was the first to go under water.

Aldrich said his two sisters, Margaret and Sherry, who lived in Andover and Walpole, N.H., were planning his mother's funeral, and that his uncle, David Allbee of Westminster, would be handling his mother's estate and other legal issues.

Allbee wasn't available for comment Wednesday, according to a woman who answered the telephone at his home.

Santaw said she knew many of the Cornish members of the rescue squad. "I know the town, they're my friends, I hate to say anything," she said. "But they should take some training before you jeopardize somebody's life."

Santaw said Yates hadn't wanted to go to Springfield Hospital for treatment because of a previous bad experience in the winter and that was why she told her friend Edgar Emerson she didn't want an ambulance.

Emerson had left Yates sitting on the banks of the Connecticut River before he took his boat to seek help at the boat landing, had said Tuesday evening that Yates didn't want an ambulance for what she considered minor injuries.

The boat in question is still on the bottom of the Connecticut River, stuck in the muddy silt, according to Robertson. Robertson said that a dive team would be brought in Thursday morning to retrieve the boat. The boat is stuck in a vacuum-like condition, he said, and the more they try and pull it out, the tighter a hold the mud has.

Robertson said the boat had moved since the accident, probably due to the river's current.

Robertson and Hathaway said that in addition to the four professional rescuers, private citizens also tried to help rescue Yates, after the boat sank.

He said Yates' body finally was freed from the boat after being under way for about an hour. Her body was taken to the New Hampshire Medical Examiner's Office in Concord for an autopsy.

 

[BladesRobinson]

Divers retrieve rescue airboat

August 25, 2006
By Susan Smallheer Herald Staff

SPRINGFIELD — As authorities continued investigating the drowning death of a Rockingham woman, divers working for the New Hampshire Marine Patrol Thursday pulled a key piece of evidence from the Connecticut River — the rescue boat that sank while trying to assist the victim.

The boat, a 16-foot Yankee airboat made in Sebago, Maine, was pulled from the river's muddy bottom at about noon. Attached to its bow was the rescue litter that pulled Virginia Allbee Yates, 64, to her death.

Members of the Marine Patrol removed the boat to be examined by its own experts, according to Sullivan County Attorney Marc Hathaway, who is overseeing the Marine Patrol investigation. Hathaway said the boat would be held at a secure but undisclosed location. The boat was retrieved by a private diving company based in Lake Winnipesaukee, he said.

Hathaway refused to answer questions about the investigation, although he said the boat's recovery should advance the probe. Hathaway spoke to reporters at Hoyt's Landing in Springfield, where the boat was brought ashore.

After examining the backboard and litter, Hathaway wouldn't say whether he saw anything obviously wrong with the equipment. The boat will either answer investigators' questions, he said, or raise new ones.

"Assumptions are constantly balanced against new facts," he said.

The Marine Patrol, assisted by the N.H. Fish and Game Department, is investigating whether rescue personnel from the Cornish (N.H.) Rescue Squad, working with a firefighter-medic from the Springfield Fire Department, erred while trying to assist Yates.

Yates is believed to have drowned when the boat sank. She was strapped onto a backboard, which in turn was tied into an emergency litter called a Stokes basket. An autopsy performed by the New Hampshire Medical Examiner's office determined the cause of death was drowning.

After the boat sank, friends who were nearby, and the four rescue crew members, tried and failed to free Yates.

Throughout the day Thursday, friends gathered to grieve Yates at Hoyt's Landing, the popular boat launch on the Connecticut and Black rivers. Many of them said they considered Yates their "second mom," or honorary grandmother. Yates was the mother of three grown children and had retired a few years ago from cooking at area restaurants.

"Ginny was my second ma," said Paul "Edgar" Emerson of Westminster, who took Yates boating the afternoon of the accident.

The rescue airboat, approximately 16 feet long, featured a large fan on its stern, with an elevated driver's seat immediately in front of it. It was purchased by the volunteer Cornish Rescue Squad this year.

The Yankee airboat was manufactured by a small company that has been making the specialized boats for close to 30 years, according to a company employee. Its Web site calls it "the only four-season rescue craft with the capability to match the emergency."

According to the Yankee airboat Web site, the craft's main use in New England is for winter rescues across frozen or half-frozen water. Because it is fan-driven, the boat also can be operated on dry land.

The boat is designed to operate on ice-covered rivers, lakes and ponds, as well as in whitewater conditions.

As authorities continued their work Thursday, Christopher Aldrich of Claremont, N.H., Yates' only living son, said investigators have been shutting out family members seeking information about the drowning.

Hathaway said it wasn't his intention to exclude family members. He said he met with Yates' brother, David Allbee, the night of the accident, and would talk to other family members soon.

Aldrich said he is planning to contact a lawyer, if only to get his questions answered.

"Why is my mom dead? Somebody did something wrong," Aldrich said Thursday. "Everyone else had flotation devices, but not my mother."

Yates' friends lingered at the boat landing for more than an hour after the boat was hauled away on a trailer, headed for its undisclosed location.

"I wanted to see it," said Paul "Edgar" Emerson of Westminster, who was boating with Yates the afternoon she slipped and fell at a friend's dock on the Connecticut River in Springfield.

Emerson left to seek help for Yates after she fell and hit her head on the riverbank. He had pulled his pontoon boat to the dock because Yates said she needed to use the bathroom. Somehow during the transfer to shore, Yates slipped and fell, he said, twisting her ankle and hitting her head.

Yates loved being out on the water, and Emerson said he often took her on cruises up and down the Connecticut River. Yates suffered from emphysema and used oxygen. The fresh air on the river was a tonic to her, he said.

Calling hours for Yates are Saturday, from 1 to 3 p.m. at the Fenton & Hennessey Funeral Home in Bellows Falls. Burial will be private.

Emerson said the last time he saw Yates, she was being attended to by medics. He said she apologized to him for putting a damper on their afternoon of fun, and for causing so much fuss. She considered her injury minor, he said.

"She said, 'I'm so sorry, Edgar,'" Emerson said. "She did not want to go on that boat."

 

[rongoodman]

Has there been any more information about how this happened?

 

[NHscubajay]

Blades,
I am a member of a fire department dive team in NH and we are watching this case as well. Personally with all of my rescue training I can not understand why someone would actually think that securing the basket to a vessel was wise. This looks like it could get ugly for the agancies involved. Especially with the boat manufacturer and Gerry Dworkin saying things were suspect.

 

[BladesRobinson]

I am certain we will hear more about this tragedy but right now, it is prudent to LEARN from the facts already known and gather additional facts before making assumptions. This is a true tragedy ... tragic for the victim, tragic for the family, tragic for the friend who took the victim boating, tragic for the volunteers who attampted the rescue. Everyone who was there has had their lives changed forever.

This is one of those cases where many of us can learn, evaluate and decide what we would do differently, using the advantage of hindsight. I believe it is prudent for all professionals to take advantage of this learning opportunity so a similar tragedy is not repeated.

Blades

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =​

Blades,
I am a member of a fire department dive team in NH and we are watching this case as well. Personally with all of my rescue training I can not understand why someone would actually think that securing the basket to a vessel was wise. This looks like it could get ugly for the agancies involved. Especially with the boat manufacturer and Gerry Dworkin saying things were suspect.

 

[BladesRobinson]

I pass this update along...
Blades

No charges in botched rescue

February 28, 2007
By Susan Smallheer Herald Staff

NEWPORT, N.H. — No criminal charges will be filed in connection with the failed rescue of an elderly Vermont woman, who drowned last summer in the Connecticut River when the airboat she was strapped into sank.

Marc Hathaway, the Sullivan County attorney, said Tuesday that the mistakes by the rescue crew and the driver of the Cornish Rescue Squad's new airboat did not rise to the level of negligent homicide in the death of Virginia Yates, 64, of Rockingham.

Hathaway said that while many mistakes were made in the Aug. 22 rescue attempt, none by themselves caused the death of Yates, a retired cook.

"The risk became apparent only after the craft was under way," he said. "They fully expected the trip to be made safely. Their behavior does not rise to the level of criminal conduct."

Yates drowned when the airboat sank about a half mile from Hoyt's Landing, a public boat access on the Vermont side of the river. She was strapped onto a backboard and rescue litter, which in turn was strapped to the boat.

Yates, who had been out on the river with a friend earlier in the day, had twisted her ankle and fallen when they stopped at a private dock in Springfield so Yates could go to the bathroom.

At an afternoon press conference in the Sullivan County Courthouse in Newport, Hathaway said the four rescue workers, including EMT George Wheeler of the Springfield, Vt., Fire Department — only had seconds to respond.

The boat was swamped almost immediately after it left shore on its way back to Hoyt's Landing and a waiting ambulance.

According to the report, Robert Drye of Cornish, the president of the Cornish Rescue Squad, was operating the boat when it sank. On board were two other Cornish rescue squad members, Gary Chilton and Larry Dingee, along with Wheeler. Hathaway said the investigation focused on Drye's actions.

Hathaway listed seven contributing factors that led to the tragedy, including the fact that the Cornish Rescue Squad, an independent, nonprofit volunteer group, had inadequate training on the boat, which it had owned for less than two months. The boat had only 17.9 hours use registered on its engine, according to the report.

Hathaway's report noted that the boat's crew was unfamiliar with the weight limitations of the boat, and the dimensions of the boat itself, and that there was a lack of standard operating procedures and protocols governing the boat rescues.

The report also noted that a passing ski boat set off a one-foot wake that helped to swamp the already overloaded boat, whose bow was dangerously close to the waterline.

Hathaway said Drye tried to steer the boat into the wake, but the wake pushed even more water into the airboat, and it flipped over and sank.

The county attorney's report said state law concerning boat overloading under such circumstances was "ambiguous in the context of criminal negligence" and there were no state standards regulating airboats.

Wheeler, who had treated Yates on shore for her injuries before she was loaded onto the boat, joined the three Cornish members on their boat at the last minute at their invitation. The added weight of Yates, who weighed about 150 pounds, and Wheeler, who weighed about 245 pounds, further compromised the boat's carrying capacity, the report noted.

Wheeler told investigators that when water quickly started coming over the bow of the boat, both he and the other Cornish squad members leaned forward in an attempt to keep Yates dry, which ultimately made the problem worse.

Wheeler said he tried to undo the straps that tied Yates to the sinking boat, but was unable to get the straps untied after the boat sank and he had to surface for air. Yates was not wearing a life vest, and the Stokes litter did not have any flotation devices either, the report stated.

Wheeler said he tried to find the air bubbles coming up from the oxygen that Yates was on and dive back down to rescue her, but the current carried him away and he couldn't swim well with his duty boots and clothing on.

Drye told investigators he was trying to get Dingee to move toward the back of the boat in one of the passenger seats to redistribute the weight in the boat shortly before they were swamped.

Hathaway's 283-page report included interviews with people directly involved in the rescue, witnesses on the river and friends of Yates on the dock, and the manufacturer of the boat, the Maine Yankee Airboat Co. of Sebago, Maine. The New Hampshire investigation also included two re-enactments of the accident on Lake Winnipesaukee using the Cornish airboat.

Hathaway said the re-enactments helped clarify to him what had happened. He said his report was long in coming because the final reports didn't reach his office until January, and then his report had to be written and organized.

The boat company's president, Harold Williams, told the New Hampshire investigators that he had initially warned Cornish Rescue Squad members that the boat they wanted was too small for rescue work because of all the equipment and people they would bring on any rescue, and he urged them to use a bigger boat. He also claimed he told them to only use the boat in shallow waters.

Williams also told investigators he told Cornish officials that the boat's top capacity was four people.

Hathaway said the airboat would be returned to the Cornish Rescue Squad, and it was up to the squad how the boat would be used in the future.

According to Capt. Mark Gallagher of the N.H. Marine Patrol, who was at the press conference, the N.H. Fish and Game Department has a similar airboat, but he said he did not know whether it had ever been used in a rescue.

Hathaway said he had talked to the Yates family privately last week and given them copies of the report; he too asked the media not to contact either the members of the Cornish Rescue Squad or the Yates family.

Hathaway said the N.H. Department of Safety was conducting its own investigation.

Robert Morgan of Brownsville, Vt., who works for the Concord, N.H., law firm of Tarbell Professional Association, is representing Yates' estate. He listened quietly in the back of the small conference room and later spoke to some reporters.

Morgan said it was too early to say what Yates' surviving family would do and whether they would pursue a wrongful death lawsuit against the people involved in the accident.

Morgan said Yates' three surviving children had been devastated by their mother's death and the attention her tragic death had brought to them, and he said none of them wanted to speak to the media about their mother's death or the report.

"The report is long. A lot of the material is painful," Morgan said. "We have to take our time to understand what's in there. It truly is very sad."

 

[james croft]

Thanks for bringing this to our attention. Definitely something to think about. Bad for everyone involved.

 

[Boater Dan]

Blades:

Thanks for the update. I was trying to follow the case but I not seen much information on it. I not only do PSD, but also River Rescue and Swiftwater as well and I have been sharing the information on this with the team and some instructors we deal with.

I do have to say that I can agree with the findings. While it certainly was a tragic accident and I am certain devistating for the family as well as the department, I did not necessarily feel that what was done was criminal. Civil will be a completely different manner however.

The key for all of us is that we all learn from what occurred and insure that we educate our personnel so that this is never replicated.

Dan