EL DORADO COUNTY, Calif. (KCRA) \u2014 A California Highway Patrol rescue team is being credited with helping save a South Lake Tahoe hiker who nearly fell to her death.<\/p>\n
The 27-year-old from South Lake Tahoe was hiking near Luther Pass in El Dorado County with her boyfriend and dog when the dog slipped.<\/p>\n
The hiker reached to save the dog. But she lost her footing in the process, causing her to fall down the steep mountainside.<\/p>\n
She slid head over heel for roughly 15 feet before free-falling off a 30-foot tall cliff.<\/p>\n
CHP helicopter pilot Bryan Souza was part of a four-man crew dispatched to rescue her.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe was very fortunate that she landed on her backside, which gave her some injuries. But ultimately the way she fell, I think, saved her life,\u201d Souza said.<\/p>\n
A video released by CHP was taken from the vantage point of the flight officer onboard. It begins by showing the injured woman tucked in the bushes at the base of a sheer rock cliff. Standing alongside her are her boyfriend and dog.<\/p>\n
After picking up two flight paramedics, the helicopter returned and a paramedic was lowered to the base of the cliff. The paramedic secured the hiker\u2019s foot in a brace before she was raised up to the helicopter, giving the crew a smile as the helicopter hovered at more than 7,900 feet.<\/p>\n
Once on board, the crew learned the extent of the victim\u2019s injuries.<\/p>\n
\u201cHer hands, tips of her fingers were pretty raw from grabbing onto rocks and bushes to stop herself,” Souza said. “It was completely mangled on her hands.\u201d<\/p>\n
She also suffered injuries to her ankle, knee and left shoulder.<\/p>\n
In a statement, the hiker, who asked not to be identified, said \u201cCHP did a great job and I am very grateful for the people who helped me. It was an accident that could have happened to any hiker in the Sierra.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rescuers said if you find yourself in a situation similar to this, there\u2019s an app on your phone that can help save you.<\/p>\n
Most smartphones have a compass app that can determine your exact latitude and longitude.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s a coordinate that we can use to help locate you in the time of an emergency,\u201d Souza said.<\/p>\n
In this case, the hiker\u2019s boyfriend opened the app and was able to pass along their location to a dispatcher, who relayed it to the helicopter crew.<\/p>\n
The victim was transported to Barton Hospital in South Lake Tahoe. The victim\u2019s boyfriend and dog were fine and hiked out without incident.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
EL DORADO COUNTY, Calif. (KCRA) \u2014 A California Highway Patrol rescue team is being credited with helping save<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"featured_image_urls":{"full":"","thumbnail":"","medium":"","medium_large":"","large":"","1536x1536":"","2048x2048":"","darknews-slider-full":"","darknews-featured":"","darknews-medium":"","darknews-medium-square":""},"author_info":{"display_name":"News MoLo","author_link":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/author\/admin\/"},"category_info":"News<\/a>","tag_info":"News","comment_count":"0","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5937"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5937"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5937\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5938,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5937\/revisions\/5938"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5937"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5937"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.newsmolo.com\/EDC\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5937"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}