Lifesavers Around the Globe

Just past midnight on Dec. 24, 1955, a levee on California’s Feather River collapsed releasing a 21-foot wall of water into Yuba City and surrounding farmlands. As the flood victims huddled on rooftops and clung to tree branches, they could hear in the distance the throbbing noise of a Coast Guard helicopter coming to their rescue.

Winter darkness. Reindeer sleds. A 1,500-mile push over sea ice and tundra to reach ice-locked whalers—led by a tireless frontier physician whose care, grit, and camera preserved a rescue for the ages.

It should come as no surprise that over 100 years ago a Coast Guard aviator was the first to pilot an aircraft across the Atlantic. Elmer Fowler Stone topped the list of applicants for the Revenue Cutter Service School of Instruction class of 1913, a small group that would feature several distinguished graduates in the history of Coast Guard aviation.

The Coast Guard has a rich history of underwater operations. Since the early 1940s, the service has nurtured a diving capability that has become vital to modern Coast Guard missions.

“Kill the engines,” Jackson ordered. In the eerie quiet, they heard a metallic tapping. Closer now, they saw a man in a second-story attic window, striking its metal bars with a quarter. He and his bedridden, 87-year-old mother had been trapped for days in water up to their necks. Jackson’s team sawed through the attic ceiling.

From evacuating stranded survivors to reopening critical waterways, the Coast Guard (USCG) performed heroically during Hurricane Katrina, but the widespread disaster exposed operational limitations that soon served as lessons learned and has resulted in sweeping changes in readiness, technology, and interagency collaboration.

The fact that all these aircraft, from all these agencies, completely avoided any major aerial mishaps has become known as the “Miracle of Katrina.”

Oftentimes during a crisis, an iconic image or object defines that moment. During the search and rescue effort following landfall of Hurricane Katrina, several of those images and relics became a hallmark of Aug. 29, 2005, the day the massive storm ravaged the Gulf Coast. To the men and women stationed at Coast Guard Air Station New Orleans, the air station’s sign became that iconic relic.

The Coast Guard’s response to Katrina was not simply wild improvisation. After gaining significant hurricane response experience during Hurricanes Hugo and Bob, planning, training, and extensive preparations were made for a catastrophic weather scenario. Coast Guardsmen in the field would rely heavily on these plans and preparations. These instructions could be summarized as “don’t wait for permission,” and they became the basis for successful improvisation.

Search and rescue cases typically have a clear beginning, middle and end. Search and rescue on the Rio Grande, however, is different.