Lt Albert Drake is describing how an eight-year-old girl came to be in NoraRichardson's ICU unit...
"We took the old man out to the Osprey and put him on the heart monitor and auto-defibrillation unit. Then we started searching for the granddaughter.
That took another 20 minutes. We found her on the edge of the field where
we landed. The snow was up to my waist in places and I never would have
found her except for the flashlight."
Nora couldn't help but notice the shift from 'we' to 'I'. Al had to be hurting in ways she could not hope to fathom. His entire existence as a Pararescue specialist focused on saving lives. Al stopped, his voice just short of a sob. "She was leaning on a fencepost, holding the flashlight over her head, above the snow." Al stopped again, the pain in his voice now plain for anyone to hear.
"She had to have been hit with the rotor wash. That would have been 70 or 80 knot winds with snow. It buried her, but obviously she didn't move or drop the flashlight to protect herself."
Tears now fell from his still closed eyes. "As God is my witness we had her in the bird and were airborne in less than five minutes."
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