Answering the Call
When the Christchurch Earthquake hit, the call for help was immediate. Without hesitation, rescue helicopters from all over the country converged on the city, knowing the next few hours and days would be critical.
The two basic principles behind the use of rescue helicopters are speed and access.
The ability to reach an accident scene that may otherwise be cut off from normal forms of access and quickly transfer victims to emergency trauma centres are key to air rescue operations.
Rescue pilots, paramedics and ground crews all over the country, train incessantly and practice scenarios that test their skill and experience to the limit so they can be ready at a moments notice to respond to a call for help.
A few short moments after 12.51pm on 22nd February 2011 that call came.
The 6.3 magnitude earthquake that shook Christchurch was another in a sequence of thousands of aftershocks to have hit since a 7.1 magnitude quake woke the city in the early hours of September 4th 2010.
Whether this latest one was strictly an aftershock or a ‘new’ earthquake in its own right matters only to geologists and scientists - what really matters to everyone else is the effect this one had.
It hit Christchurch like a bullet from a gun, rocketing out from it’s epicenter beneath Lyttelton Harbour towards Christchurch’s eastern suburbs and the densely populated Central Business District.
Within minutes, Christchurch was a disaster zone. Reports started coming through of major building collapses, significant destruction to infrastructure, fires and multiple fatalities.
As the city dealt with the immediate shock of the situation, a National Health Emergency Plan was activated. This pre-determined response to national disasters included an Ambulance National Major Incident and Emergency Plan (AMPLANZ) alerting every Air Rescue and Air Ambulance service in New Zealand of the unfolding crisis.
Simon Duncan, General Manager of Garden City Helicopters which operates our region’s air rescue and air ambulance fleet, takes up the story:
“Fortunately our base, equipment and aircraft suffered no damage so we were airborne within four minutes.” said Simon.
“We called our back-up Squirrel helicopter into the central city with a monsoon bucket because the Fire Service were hampered getting access to some buildings with the streets covered in rubble. We took water from the Avon River and dropped buckets on the CTV building which had a major fire at one end.
We took a quick City flyover to access the situation and began landing in downtown city carparks to begin ferrying Status 1 and 2 patients to Christchurch Hospital. Again, the destruction of buildings meant that access for road ambulances was difficult in some of the hardest hit areas.
Because all of Christchurch’s ambulances were now responding to the situation, we had to land on the road directly outside Christchurch Hospital, which authorities had closed off for us.
We then began winching people off some of the higher building rooftops and out of hotel windows where they were trapped.” he says.
Garden City Helicopters rescue aircraft from Nelson and Greymouth were already on their way to the stricken city and Simon sent an urgent text message to Graeme Gale, head of Otago Helicopters in Dunedin - “Send three BK 117’s with full crews NOW !”
By the evening all but seven of the nations dedicated rescue helicopter fleet were parked at Garden City’s base next to Christchurch Airport. The twelve rescue helicopters from Christchurch, Greymouth, Nelson, Otago, Wellington and Northland had joined every available fixed-wing air ambulance in the country which had also arrived throughout the day.
Over the next 24 hours and beyond, patients were transferred to medical facilities outside the quake affected region as required while crews continued day and night winch operations to insert Urban Search and Rescue teams (USAR) into the central city.
As operations continued, Garden City utilised some of their commercial aircraft for logistical support including the ongoing requirements for aerial filming. With the airspace above the city restricted, each individual flight required new transponder codes for approval to fly over the restricted zones.
The operating environment throughout the emergency was intense. Central Christchurch had been reduced to rubble and was likened to a war zone. The death toll from the quake was rising as each day passed and many of the city’s outer suburbs were still cut-off without power, sewerage or water.
Some pilots, paramedics and ground crews worked with the added pressure of damage to their own homes and hardships for their families.
The support of rescue helicopter teams from outside Christchurch allowed us to not only increase our physical rescue capacity but to also rotate our pilots and winch operators for mandatory rest periods.
As the days wore on and the emergency stabilised, helicopter operations were wound down and support crews from around the country returned to their own bases.
The Christchurch earthquake was a national disaster on an unprecedented scale. It produced an emergency situation, the likes of which had never been seen before in this country.
Thanks to the dedication and expertise of our crews and ground-support built on a constant programme of training integrated with other teams throughout the country and a nationally coordinated emergency response we were able to meet the challenge.
