Terrifying footage shows injured hiker, 74, spinning out of control in her stretcher during helicopter mountain rescue
TERRIFYING footage shows an elderly stretcher-bound hiker spinning uncontrollably as she dangles underneath a rescue helicopter in Arizona.
The shocking clips show the 74-year-old stranded mid air on the rapidly turning gurney as she is airlifted to hospital after suffering head injuries in a mountain fall.
The astonishing video has now gone viral and has already been viewed millions of times after it was posted on Facebook.
Phoenix Fire Department were called to help the injured woman in isolated Piestewa Peak after she suffered facial and head injuries.
She was put on a stretcher attached to a hoist that was then lifted up from the ground towards the helicopter.
However, the rate of rotation soon speeds up as the crew on the helicopter haul the basket closer to the rotors, ABC15 reported.
Efforts to stop the spinning were then hampered as a line intended to stop the basket rotating snapped.
“Sometimes when we bring the helicopter up from the ground, (the basket) will start to spin,” said Paul Apolinar, chief pilot of the police department’s aviation unit.
“We have a line attached to the basket that’s supposed to prevent that. Today it didn’t.”
Derek Geisel, who was piloting the helicopter during the rescue claimed that the line attached to the basket eventually malfunctioned.
The shocking spinning lasted for 40 seconds as the crew tried several times to raise and lower the basket.
“When they start to lower the load, (the basket) does actually start to stop,” said the pilot
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“And then we slowly brought it back up, it gets into the same downwash from the aircraft and it started to spin again.
“Once we got the forward flight, the spin got to the point where they were safely able to bring the patient up to the aircraft.”
The woman suffered nausea and dizziness and was transported to a trauma centre with no serious injuries, it was reported.