An injured sailor was airlifted from a cargo ship off the British Columbia coast on Friday in a helicopter rescue launched from Canadian Forces Base Comox.
A statement from 19 Wing Comox says the injured crew member required urgent hospital care while the ship was approximately 315 kilometres west of Vancouver Island.
The ship’s captain contacted the Joint Rescue Co-ordination Centre in Victoria to request a helicopter medevac due to the considerable travel time to the nearest port, the statement said.
A Cormorant helicopter and a Kingfisher search-and-rescue plane were dispatched from the Comox airbase to the vessel.
Two search-and-rescue technicians were lowered from the helicopter to the deck of the cargo ship to prepare the patient for transport.
The injured mariner was hoisted aboard the Cormorant and transported to Victoria General Hospital for treatment, the statement said.
Capt. Brad Little, a spokesperson for 19 Wing Comox, said Monday the condition of the sailor is not known to the rescuers.
“Once we transfer them to higher care, at that point, we can be re tasked immediately to the next mission,” he said in an interview.
“So, for the health and safety and the sanity of the SAR techs and everybody concerned, we make it our business not to follow up on those details.”
The Joint Rescue Coordination Centre in Victoria handles an average of 1,969 calls for assistance each year, more than two-thirds of which involve maritime incidents, according to the centre’s data.
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