It took an Army National Guard helicopter to lift a researcher out of the crevasse he rolled into Friday in Badlands National Park.
Head ranger Mark Gorman said the technical rescue was the most difficult he has encountered during his 10 years at BNP.
According to Gorman, a two-person team of researchers was attempting reach a valley floor about 1,000 feet below them when a gust of wind blew Emmett Evanoff of Longmont, Colo., off his feet.
"He fell off the ridge into a very steep, narrow crevasse about 60 feet below," Gorman said. Evanoff was badly injured and wedged in the crevasse. He is listed in fair condition at Rapid City Regional Hospital, where he was airlifted after the rescue.
Evanoff's companion climbed back to the top where he had just enough cell phone power to call 911 for help at about 3 p.m., Gorman said.
The researchers were working about 5 miles into the backcountry of a very remote section of the park called the Greater Conata Basin.
Evanoff is an associate professor of geology and earth sciences at the University of Northern Colorado at Greeley, according to the university's Web site.
Initial global-positioning coordinates for their location were wrong, Gorman said.
"We weren't even sure we had a rescue in the state," Gorman said.
Once the accident was located, rescuers discovered the injured man was "wedged in tight" in a spot about 600 feet of the Badlands floor, Gorman said.
An Army National Guard helicopter and doctor were called to assist with lifting the victim out of the Badlands formation and lowering him to a medical evacuation helicopter waiting on the Badlands floor.
"It was very complicated. We started at 3 p.m. and were not done until 8:30 p.m.," Gorman said. "We had about 30 people on the scene, and we needed them all to run the operation."
The park's technical rescue team, Wall Fire Department, Wall ambulance, Jackson County Sheriff's Office and Pennington County Search and Rescue assisted with the rescue.
Contact Andrea Cook at 394-8423 or andrea.cook@rapidcityjournal.com.
