So Others May Live

So Others May Live

By HM1 Stephanie Higgens, USN

There’s nothing like the feeling of saving a fellow man’s life. The Navy’s Search and Rescue Medical Technician (SMT) rate is one not quite like any other. There are currently 104 SMTs Navy-wide with the majority of us being assigned to Helicopter Sea Combat Squadrons on the MH-60S platform. Our position is Naval Aircrew Corpsman, with many of us choosing to become Utility Aircrewman. We specialize and train for emergency medicine purposes in a multitude of environments ranging from deserts, ships, mountains, and transports in the back of various aircraft including MH-60S, V-22, CH-53, CH-47, and small fixed wing aircraft. Much like the MH-60S which is considered the “best multi mission naval helicopter,” SMTs must become the most adaptable personnel in the cabin. The vast majority of SMT’s also take on the responsibility of becoming Utility Aircrewmen, not only mastering emergency medicine in the back of the aircraft but taking on the extensive responsibilities of being the cabin operators and the pilot’s eyes and ears. We are lookouts, weapon operators, and deployers of Rescue Swimmers on Search and Rescue (SAR) missions as well as the sole person responsible for emergency medicine.

“Search and Rescue Medical Technicians perform aircrew and emergency medical care functions in support of Search and Rescue, MEDEVAC, and CASEVAC Missions for Navy and Marine Corps Aviation. Certified in Advanced Cardiac Life Support (ACLS), Advanced Trauma Life Support (ATLS), Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation (CPR), triage, intravenous (IV) therapy, medicine administration, use of emergency medical equipment, patient handling, and aero-medical evacuation techniques.”

Not only are we Naval Aircrewman but SMTs also take on roles of Marine medics, civilian transport, ship’s company HM, as well as Corpsmen in hospital/clinic administration settings. Many of us take on a multitude of these roles at just one duty station. This rate is not for the faint of heart or unmotivated. Many start their careers being the only medical support Corpsman for squadrons of over two to three hundred Sailors or Marines at a time. We don’t take our responsibilities lightly. It takes someone willing to put in a lot of work in order to adapt to constant changes in medicine with the drive to continually improve your skills.

Out of the 125 SMTs currently serving in the Navy, there are 7 females who hold this position. HM2 Sara Morris has been in the Navy for eight years, beginning her SMT career after her first command at NAS Whidbey Island, WA. After completing the SMT pipeline, she went on to serve at HSC26 where she deployed to Bahrain. She is now at HSC-2 in Norfolk, VA training new SMTs at their last stop in the pipeline before going to their first command in the Fleet. I have worked with HM2 Morris for over two years now and she is probably the most humble human I have ever come across. Not all of our rescues are glamorous, in fact most are what we would say “simple,” but they are only perceived that way due to our training and ability to make educated decisions in critical situations. In May of this year, HM2 saved one of her neighbor’s lives. This individual was outside his house one evening when all of a sudden he experienced excruciating chest pain and ended up lying on the ground outside of his home, unable to move. It was late at night and hard to see a body in the dark obscured by a vehicle. HM2 and her husband just so happened to be coming home when they heard calls for help. After finding her neighbor on the ground she quickly assessed him, realizing what was happening and called for emergency services. Her quick action ended up saving his life. I had the pleasure of speaking with her neighbor, Mr. Lowe, and he said, “In today's world one often hears "THANK YOU FOR YOUR SERVICE". I would take it a step further and say 'THANK THE MILITARY FOR THE TRAINING' they provide. Paid off in my case.”

HM1 Erin Williams has been in the U.S. Navy since 2009 and served in her first duty station as an SMT in 2014. She states her most memorable rescue was in the early spring of 2021 while stationed at VX-31 SAR. They received a call for a fallen canyoneer in Rainbow Canyon, a large popular canyon within Death Valley National Park. Rainbow Canyon varies in depths with its steep canyon walls reaching 1,000 feet tall. The report stated that the anchor point the canyoneering couple had been using gave way and the patient had fallen at least 100 feet. Once they located the canyoneering pair on a small ledge midway down the canyon wall, their crew rigged for the rappel to execute the rescue.

"With the assistance of my crew, I proceeded to rappel approximately 180 feet down to the patient. Once on the canyon wall, I traversed over to the patient while my crew found a place to land on the opposite canyon rim with an advantageous vantage point to maintain line of site communications with my radio. When I got to the patient I quickly introduced myself and began to treat her. It was at that time I realized the extent of her injuries. There was a large pool of blood around her leg and there were two makeshift tourniquets that had been fashioned to control massive arterial bleeding caused by an open compound fracture on her right leg. She was conscious and able to speak and I quickly learned that the other individual with her was her boyfriend. I asked them to point to the location the anchor had given way. Her boyfriend, who had sustained facial and head injuries from the fallen rock, told me that the point of injury was actually far from where we were. I continued to assess her other injuries and apply an additional tourniquet to her leg. He told me that when the anchor gave way and she fell, he had initially assessed her. He went on to tell me as I worked that he had attended a Wilderness First Responder Course. When he noticed that she had a major bleed he worked quickly to control the bleeding by cutting their climbing rope. He then said that once he had applied his tourniquet, he tried to call 911 but had no service. He proceeded to carry her traversing the steep canyon wall for 45 minutes until he was able to get enough signal for a distress call. I was blown away by this. After finishing addressing her additional wounds and packaging her onto the SAR litter, I got her boyfriend secured inside an additional extrication device and the two of us carefully traversed the terrain to offset him from the more critical patient to be recovered by the aircraft. I radioed for the crew to pick him up first while I held the more critical patient to the wall in order to get them both to a trauma center. After I got him in a safe position, I moved back to his girlfriend. The aircraft then moved in, and rappelled HM2 Kyle O’Brien to retrieve the boyfriend. Once O’Brien and the boyfriend were safely in the aircraft, I set up a harness for a litter recovery to get the critical patient out of the canyon. When we finally made it to the trauma center, the critical patient was thanking me profusely and all I had to say to her was “Don’t thank me; your boyfriend saved your life today.” Given the right circumstance and a little bit of knowledge, people can do truly amazing things.

I myself have been in the Navy for 11 years. I have been assigned to a station SAR command, expeditionary command, and now I am training new rescue swimmers as well as SMTs at HSC-2.

Though I have a handful of rescues and MEDEVACs under my belt as well as civilian transports, my most memorable rescue is by far my first. It was a regular training flight that turned into a SAR of opportunity when the crewchief onboard witnessed a single vehicle crash on a desolate desert road we just happened to be flying over. There was one person in the vehicle in critical condition, she was not wearing a seatbelt and was found in the back of the car she had been driving. We thankfully had a seasoned crew on the flight and were able to successfully transport the patient to a level two trauma center 30 minutes away. At that moment, I didn’t fully comprehend the level of training, teamwork, and critical thinking that goes into every rescue and every flight. It was then that I realized just exactly what I was getting into being part of the SMT Community and just how much training I still needed to accomplish.

The ability to work as a team is unparalleled in this community and it is extraordinary to see what is needed when engaged in a rescue. To this day, I recall how calm the crewchief was, or at least looked, from my perspective when talking the pilots into a less than ideal landing with brown out conditions as well as loose power lines. Or, how my HM1 at the time was able to work with myself, a rookie, and our flight surgeon on board who had no idea how to operate in the back of a MH60. Due to the control and coordination it takes the pilots to get the aircraft in position in less than ideal landing zones and then safely and effectively getting us to a hospital in record time, it was this rescue that will stay with me forever. This is a constant reminder how proud I am of my fellow Aircrewmen and why I strive to continue to better myself.

It is hard to put into words how proud I am to be a part of this community. We spend endless hours in our office and then jump in the back of an aircraft like it is our second home when needed. We work with supplies that we can carry as well as limited machines that are adequate in the small space we have in the back of the aircraft. Manning this position in the Navy does not come without inherent risk. All of us on active duty right now know just how much dedication it takes to fill this role and the heartache that comes with losing a brother or sister in the line of duty. I once heard a fellow Sailor ask an SMT, "Why do you do this job,?" Their response was quite simple, and has stayed with me ever since. They simply replied, “If not me, then who?” and as I have come to learn, they were right. Who has a heart big enough to dedicate years of their lives to learning a craft unlike any other? Who is slightly crazy enough to fly in the back of a MH-60 rescuing a lost hiker who somehow got stuck on the edge of a cliff and has to rappel down the side of a mountain to get them? Who is brave enough to know each flight could always be their last flight but gets in anyways because we need training, or someone needs help? Every time an aircraft is launched, we relay to home or tower how many souls are on board. Every time we launch for a rescue we have a rough estimate of how many souls need help, 99% of the time if not 100% we have no idea who this soul is that we are going to rescue, but we go because there is something in us that makes us different. It is something that makes us SMTs and what is inside that drives us to live by our motto, “So Others May Live.”