Multiple Same-Day Medical Responses

On the evening of Saturday, July 22nd, dispatchers in Moffat County received a satellite telephone call from rafters on the Green River within the park. They reported that one of their number had broken his ribs, asked for an ambulance, and said that they’d raft him the next day from Pot Creek to Echo Park, a distance of ten miles, and meet the ambulance at noon. On Sunday morning, a volunteer ambulance crew from Maybell arrived at the park and made its way down a steep single-lane dirt road to rendezvous with the Echo Park ranger. At about the same time, the Deerlodge ranger, stationed at the put-in on the Yampa River, received a call from a group on the Green River that reported that a man in their group had bruised his chest and needed a ranger evacuation from Echo Park. The Echo Park ranger was notified of this second injury. By 2 p.m. the temperature at Echo Park was 107 degrees and no rafters had arrived. The Deerlodge ranger then received a call from yet another group of rafters, who told him that they were six miles upriver, had cancelled their contract with the company that was to shuttle their cars, and didn’t know where their vehicles could be found. At 4:30 p.m., the commercial company believed to be transporting the man with the broken ribs showed up at Echo Park – but with no injured rafters and no knowledge of any injury. The Maybell ambulance, which had by then been at the park for more than six hours, was accordingly released. At about this time, the park received a call reporting that a 50-year-old woman had collapsed and was unconscious and suffering seizures at Winnie’s Grotto, four miles below Lodore in the Green River canyon. The park provided coordinates to a beach below Winnie’s to a LifeAlert helicopter from Grand Junction, which flew to the site and picked up the woman. As this was going on, the injured rafter arrived at Echo Park. He was suffering from either bruised or broken ribs plus multiple abrasions. Investigation revealed that he was the one and only injured party and that the reports of the rafter with the broken ribs and the rafter with chest bruises referred to the same man. The group had pinned a boat at Disaster Falls, but had finally extricated it. The injured man was the only experienced rafter in the group. He was driven to his vehicle at the Split Mountain boat ramp, but an hour-long search had to then be conducted to find his car keys. All visitors departed and staff were released at 10 p.m.