Credit: rso.aviation via Instagram
RIVERSIDE COUNTY, Calif. – Two people were airlifted from the desert near Joshua Tree National Park last week, after a man called 911, saying that they had run out of water, and the rescue was captured on video.
The rescue happened on June 9. According to an Instagram post from the Riverside County Sheriff’s Office Aviation Unit, a man called 911 from Painted Canyon, just north of the Salton Sea, to say that his girlfriend was dehydrated and weak.
The RSO sent a team out to find them. Video from the EMT sent down to retrieve the pair found them huddled on the ground next to a bush, with the man laying over his girlfriend, protecting her from the sun. Crews lifted the two into the helicopter.
The department said that “because of her severe condition, an aeromedical helicopter was dispatched to Rescue 9’s landing zone to fly the patient to a hospital.”
The condition of the man wasn’t immediately clear.
The Sheriff’s Office used the rescue as an opportunity to remind people of the dangers of hiking in the desert.
“Please remember as the temps increase take more water than you think you will need, have a hiking plan, and tell two people where you are going,” the office’s post said.
Reports from the National Weather Service on June 9 saw temperatures in the area where the couple was found hitting highs between 100 and 105 degrees Fahrenheit. The deserts in California are some of the hottest places in the U.S. and the world. In fact, according to the National Park Service, Furnace Creek in Death Valley National Park holds the world record for highest air temperature ever recorded, hitting 134 degrees Fahrenheit on July 10, 1913.
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