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90 – 93<br />
Air Zermatt<br />
“Give every<br />
idea a shot”<br />
A Swiss helicopter rescue<br />
team on an extraordinary<br />
mission. How a young girl<br />
was rescued after an intense<br />
13-hour battle.<br />
<strong>The</strong> crevasse in the rock in the<br />
Swiss municipality of Riederalp was<br />
just 8 inches wide. But on this day<br />
in October 2017 it had swallowed up<br />
a 2-year-old girl who had tripped<br />
while playing. It took almost 13<br />
hours to get her out, safe and sound.<br />
“An unforgettable experience for<br />
everyone who was there,” says<br />
Philipp Venetz, medical director of<br />
helicopter rescue team Air Zermatt.<br />
Air Zermatt was founded on April 1,<br />
1968. To date, more than 50,000<br />
helicopter rescues have been carried<br />
out by its highly trained crew.<br />
90<br />
Philipp<br />
Venetz<br />
Doctor, 44, SUI.<br />
“<strong>The</strong> rescued girl bore<br />
almost no sign of injury,”<br />
says Venetz, the team’s<br />
medical director.<br />
92<br />
Dominik<br />
Imhof<br />
Flight paramedic, 28, SUI.<br />
This is one mission Imhof<br />
says he will never forget:<br />
“It sent shivers down<br />
my spine.”<br />
91<br />
Michèle<br />
Imhasly<br />
Transport paramedic,<br />
40, SUI. Imhasly runs<br />
the Air Zermatt Training<br />
Center and has<br />
documented the mission.<br />
93<br />
Stephan<br />
Dreesen<br />
Pilot, 47, SUI.<br />
Dreesen’s team were<br />
there in no time:<br />
“We tried every idea to<br />
carry out the rescue.”<br />
TERO REPO, PASCAL GERTSCHEN, CHRISTIAN PFAMMATTER WOLFGANG WIESER<br />
Over the course of those hours,<br />
they tried everything to rescue her<br />
from about 20 feet down in the<br />
crevasse. “We gave every idea a<br />
shot,” pilot Stephan Dreesen says.<br />
That included a suggestion from<br />
experienced paramedic Michèle<br />
Imhasly to have the 2-year-old<br />
rescued by another secured child.<br />
But it turned out they couldn’t put<br />
that plan into effect—the gap in the<br />
rock was too narrow.<br />
In the end, the rescue workers dug<br />
an emergency exit with picks,<br />
shovels and a mechanical digger.<br />
Experts finally split the one last<br />
rock separating them from the child.<br />
At 2 a.m. it was all over and the little<br />
girl was flown by helicopter to a<br />
hospital in the Swiss capital of Bern.<br />
Air Zermatt on one<br />
of its spectacular<br />
missions against<br />
the backdrop of<br />
the Matterhorn.<br />
THE RED BULLETIN 89
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