Adrenalin Rush

The call for help came into 424 Tiger Squadron at CFB Trenton, Ont., at 2:45 p.m.

The weather on Dec. 17 had been bad all day. Snow showers with one mile visibility had kept the search and rescue standby helicopter, one of the squadron’s Bell CH-146 Griffons, in the hangar all day. At about 2:40 p.m., aircraft commander Capt David Agnew looked out the window and noticed that the weather was improving. Five minutes later, the phone in the squadron’s operations centre was ringing.

“JRCC (the Trenton Joint Rescue Coordination Centre) said there was a giant fire going on at a construction site in Kingston, and the crane operator couldn’t get down to safety,” Agnew told Canadian Skies during a private interview. “Immediately, we said we’ll take it [the mission].”

The situation was urgent: how long did the rescuers have before the 43-metre crane collapsed, or the man burned to death while suspended over the raging fire below?  

Agnew was frank: “To be honest, I was thinking this isn’t real – I mean, a guy stuck in a crane above a fire! It was like something from the movies.” Despite having more than 2,000 hours on the Griffon, Agnew’s background is in tactical helicopter missions. This was his first search and rescue (SAR) mission as an aircraft commander. It would prove to be, as one news report termed it, “a trial by fire.” 

The first officer that day was Jean-Benoit Girard-Beauseigle, known to the crew as simply “JBGB.” With no time to spare, he performed the cold weather start and all systems checks as soon as the helicopter was towed from the hangar. The crew took off 20 minutes after receiving the call. Besides Agnew and Girard-Beauseigle, the five-man crew that day also included flight engineer Cpl Iain Cleaton, SAR tech team lead Sgt Cory Cisyk, and SAR tech MCpl Matthew Davidson.

The Griffon crew was used to performing hoist rescues, particularly off boats in the lake. They knew a rescue off a stationary crane was possible; as long as smoke was not engulfing their target. During the 22-minute flight to Kingston, JRCC provided situation reports about the crane operator, later identified as 68-year-old Adam Jastrzebski of London, Ont. First, they reported that he was in the cab; then, he had climbed out on the boom; and finally, he was suffering burns from the towering inferno below. 

As they waited for the rescuers to arrive, Kingston fire crews worked to keep the crane soaked with water, in an effort to combat metal fatigue from the extreme heat. Yet more firemen worked to prevent the blaze from spreading to a neighbouring gas station. 

Meanwhile, Agnew pushed the helicopter to top speed. “The CH-146 Griffon has a limitation where we can only pull 81 percent mass torque above 105 knots, and I just kind of made the decision to exceed that limit,” said the pilot. “We were pulling up to 95 percent mass torque at times, trying to get there faster.”

The crew realized there would be no time to orbit the scene while formulating a plan. So they discussed it en route, deciding to come in low and fast, to get into hoisting position as soon as possible. 

“When we got there, we could see the flames and the smoke, and we could see how the crane was oriented. We skirted the edge of the smoke but didn’t go IMC [instrument meteorological conditions],” recounted Agnew. “We immediately positioned ourselves into the wind, in the best position to hoist him. We were about 10 feet above the crane. Cory was ready to go right out and get him.”

As Agnew was turning to the left to position over the crane, he lost visual reference on the target, so Girard-Beauseigle took control. 

“The flight engineer conned him into position, but then he lost his reference, so I took back control because I had a better reference again, once we were in position,” said Agnew. “From there, it was pretty easy in comparison to a boat hoist.”

He added that the biggest challenge was to overcome his own nerves while in the hover. “I have seen the video, and it does look like my hover is not the most stable. I’d like to say that was because of updrafts, but it was probably more nerves. My adrenaline was so pumped up that once I took control and was hovering, my knee was bouncing up and down uncontrollably, by probably three inches. Just trying to keep the tail steady while controlling my knee was a challenge!”

While everyone inside the helicopter focused on their jobs, SAR tech Cory Cisyk was being lowered to the tiny two-foot platform at the end of the crane’s boom, where Jastrzebski was holding on for his life.

Cisyk, who has been an operational SAR tech for six years, told Canadian Skies that on the way down, he was just concentrating on the obstacles and how to retrieve the crane operator. “At that point I was relying on the pilots and flight engineer to get me there,” he said. “I was just the monkey on the hook at that point. Once I got to the crane, I remember standing on two of the metal bars, looking through my feet at the ground. The man was laying down on the platform at the end. I got to him, and worked on wrapping the horse collar around him. I wanted to get him secured in place before he moved.”

It was loud under the helicopter, and Cisyk was wearing a face mask. Communication was difficult, and he had trouble getting Jastrzebski to stand up. 

“What stands out in my mind is trying to get him up so I could cinch the collar down in the proper position. He and I were struggling to stand up together. Cpl Cleaton saw that and realized exactly what was going on. He basically used the hoist to stand us up, to allow me time to secure everything properly. Then I gave the thumbs up, and off we came.”

Crew members reached out to help haul the rescued man into the Griffon. The horse collar caught on one of the seats at first, but the man was soon secured inside the helicopter. 

“He had no reaction when he got into helicopter,” remembered Cisyk. “I asked him his name first thing, and he told me. I asked him if he was hurt and tried to give him some oxygen, and he didn’t really want it. We only had him for 60 seconds, so I didn’t have time to really perform any medical care.”

Kingston General Hospital was but a half mile away. The helicopter crew shut down the Griffon, and delivered Jastrzebski to waiting medical attendants.

What followed was a “phenomenal” moment, said Agnew. “For me, anyways, we waited until we had shut down and the ambulance took him away, and then there was definitely some hooting and hollering and high fives. But it was short-lived, because then we had to fly home.”

Both Agnew and Cisyk said the rescue was a real team effort. “Everybody contributed,” said Agnew. “All our training paid off. We didn’t go by our SOPs, exactly, but all our training gave us the ability to know how we could pull this off.”

Cisyk added that this mission was unique because it took place in the public eye. “But there are SAR crews doing crazy missions that don’t make the news all the time,” he said. “It’s nice to have the recognition, but what’s really nice about this is for the public to see what we do.” 

As for Adam Jastrzebski, who suffered burns to his back, buttocks and right hand, he told QMI Agency on Dec. 18 that he is now retired from his job as a crane operator.