Jake was ten days into a springtime backcountry trip in northern British Columbia when he experienced the unexpected. With the trip wrapping up, he and his team were packing up camp. They piled gear onto pack horses, saddled up, and headed for a nearby lake where they planned to catch a plane back to the United States.
They crossed a river on horseback while leading their pack horses. A couple of saddle horses started making a commotion in the water and startled the pack horses.
A pack horse with the hard pantry box on its back hit a tree. That alarmed Jake’s horse, causing her to veer in another direction. He tried to pull up on the reins to control his violently bucking horse, but he began to lose his grip and slipped out of his saddle. Feeling trapped by the tension on her reins, his horse reared up on her hind legs. Then the unthinkable happened: Jake’s horse fell backward, landing on top of its rider!
“It sounded like tree limbs breaking,” Jake recalled. “I’ll never forget that.”
He landed on his backpack, which protected his back and head from serious injury. But the full weight of his horse’s body came crashing down on his leg.
His horse rolled over and ran away. But Jake knew immediately that his leg was severely damaged.
“My boot was still on, and all of my outer gear. I was scared to take anything off because I didn’t want to look at it. I just started screaming for help.”
As soon as his team could establish communication, Global Rescue was notified and a rescue helicopter was dispatched.
“We had a med kit with us and I took high doses of ibuprofen before the helicopter arrived.”
Global Rescue will rescue you from the point of injury or illness by any means necessary, including helicopters, jets, 4x4 vehicles, rescue teams on foot, and more, and bring you to the nearest hospital capable of delivering the needed level of medical care.
A rescue chopper arrived at the scene to transport Jake to the nearest medical facility equipped for trauma in Dease Lake, British Columbia, a small Native-Canadian reservation community.
The doctors administered pain medication and took x-rays of his injured limb. The x-rays showed multiple fractures. The doctors consulted with Global Rescue’s physicians and casted Jake’s leg. Global Rescue medical operations personnel immediately started planning to bring him back to the United States for surgery.
“I was told I needed to get back home as soon as possible,” Jake said.
A friend drove him to Whitehorse, Yukon where they met the Global Rescue critical care paramedic who had been deployed to assist in his medical care and transport him back to the U.S.
“When I got the call from one of the medical team saying that Global Rescue was going to take care of everything and escort me home, I just broke down. I was safe and I was hearing this good news after all of the bad news. That was the pivotal point in the whole situation.”
A Global Rescue membership includes medical transport back to your home or the hospital of choice near your home. No charge if you’re a member. Without it, medical evacuation can cost as much as $300,000, depending on where you are in the world and the distance you need to be transported.
Jake awaited Global Rescue’s arrival in Whitehorse and recuperated until his flight arrangements were booked and he felt well enough to travel.
Global Rescue’s medic arrived to meet him and coordinated the details for their early morning flight back to his home in Colorado.
“He carried everything for me, got me to the airport, got me a wheel chair, checked us both in, got us through customs in Vancouver, got us to Denver, got me all the way to my shuttle, jumped on the shuttle with me, rode to my house in Fort Collins, and literally tucked me in to bed.”
At Global Rescue, our experienced medical, security, and intel staff are in-house, always on standby, and fully deployable. We can arrange to have our doctors, nurses, and paramedics sent to your bedside to facilitate/oversee your care, as well as travel with you.
Global Rescue had arranged for a surgical evaluation and forwarded x-rays to the doctor. Shortly after arriving home, Jake underwent surgery. Two horizontal titanium screws were placed in the inner part of his ankle to fix the malleolus bones. Surgeons placed a 4-inch screw through his lateral malleolus bone into his tibia to repair the bone that was separated in the accident. He also had a straight fracture in his fibula, though doctors determined that it would heal on its own.
Following surgery, he continued to recover at home. He experienced some lingering swelling but was no longer in great pain. Once the cast was removed and replaced with a hard boot, he could began physical therapy.
Jake had been a Global Rescue member for years, but this was the first time he had ever experienced a medical emergency. “You buy Global Rescue hoping that you never have to use it. When it kicked in, it kicked in hard. I can’t even explain how grateful I am to Global Rescue.”
