Follow along with the video below to see how to install our site as a web app on your home screen.
Note: This feature currently requires accessing the site using the built-in Safari browser.
Kilburn and Virgil waited to be evacuated. The California Highway Patrol chopper circled several times before landing safely on a flat granite rock. Paramedic Tony Stanley got out of the helicopter, took off his helmet, put on his medical vest, and prepared to climb up the slope towards Kilburn and Grasso. No one knows exactly how it happened - whether it was the uneven ground or the lowering of the rotor blades as the helicopter powered down - but suddenly Stanley was struck from behind by one of the rotor blades.
"He took maybe three steps toward us and then was hit in the back of the head by a rotor blade," Fitch said.
Grasso ran up the hill to tell Kilburn what happened to the Stanley. "My brain caught on fire," Kilburn said. "I just wanted to be down there and do what I could do to save his life." Kilburn and Grasso came down the hill as fast as they could. Kilburn said he didn't remember any pain from his leg, "I just remember I wanted to get there."
Kilburn found one of the campers applying pressure to stop the bleeding. "The whole top in this area (gestures to top of head) was just completely flattened (as if the blade came across the top of his head)," Kilburn said.
Kilburn called for Fitch to help him work on Stanley. Fitch said Kilburn did all this while "... trying to position his ankle so he wasn't in excruciating pain, which he was."
Together they stabilized officer Stanley. And, as Fitch held his head, the pilot flew the trio to a hospital in Redding, Calif. Stanley remains in the intensive care unit. He's alive today thanks to Kilburn, Fitch, the pilot and the other campers.
"There wasn't much action on my part," Kilburn said. He says don't call him hero, just call him an Air Force doctor.
The doctor provided medical care on scene and made sure Stanley was breathing, ultimately saving his life.
“Being a US military veteran, he is not considering himself a hero, however, we do,” said Fredrick.
Officer Stanley remains in the hospital in serious to critical condition. Two other people, hiking with a youth group, helped with the rescue. Elizabeth Fitch and Bryce Harbert, of Santa Cruz, actually stumbled upon the injured doctor and later helped him save the officer's life.
