Posted on 09/14/2005 1:28:16 PM PDT by WestTexasWend
Mayday.
In the home of Scott Kerr, on the island village of Nikolski, Alaska, (pop. 36), smack-dab in the middle of nowhere, the radio call came at 8 p.m. last Thursday.
Mayday.
(snip)
And so began the rescue of Larry Csonka, Johnson and four others. It would take 14 hours. It would involve two Coast Guard flight crews traveling 600 miles. It would put Csonka & Co. in the frigid Bering Sea, in survival suits, fighting 10-foot seas and 50-knot winds, on an overnight trauma they feared was their final night.
It also would end happily, with the Coast Guard specialist who dropped out of a helicopter looking at a football in his office Tuesday, chuckling. "You won't believe what Mr. Csonka signed on it."
(snip)
"It was moment to moment," Csonka told the Anchorage News. "It was 10 or 12 hours of moment to moment with sea sickness and not being able to drink water because it was so rough and hanging onto each other."
Just after 10 a.m., a Coast Guard plane pinpointed the boat for the rescue helicopter.
(snip)
One by one, they were hauled in the basket to the helicopter. Word had been given from the start that Csonka was among them. Some Coast Guard members knew him.
Some, like flight mechanic Tiffany VanSicklen, didn't.
"He was the same as the other five people to me," she said. "I just wanted to help them."
Once everyone was safe, they went back to Nikolski. Thanks were given. Hugs, too. Metzler then pulled out a football.
"I wasn't quite certain if I should ask him to sign it considering the situation," he said.
Csonka laughed, took the football and signed straightforward as ever:
"Thanks for pulling my ass out of the sea. Larry Csonka. #39."
(Excerpt) Read more at sun-sentinel.com ...
I guess he was filming his fishing show up there? I'd like to see that episode!
You can see a camera man's camera and hand filming the basket lift rescues from inside the chopper on the Coast Guard website.
That is a great show, watched it many times.
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