# Story of a man who almost died saving two



## big bad john (1 Sep 2006)

http://www.canada.com/components/print.aspx?id=a2eb3b86-2958-423c-b727-51005d269a2f

Story of a man who almost died saving two
  
Kelly Patrick 
National Post 


Friday, September 01, 2006


Governor-General Michaelle Jean announced yesterday she had awarded a rare bravery decoration to a First Officer with the Canadian Coast Guard in B.C. Leslie Palmer, 45, is only the 20th Canadian to receive the Cross of Valour since its creation in 1972. Here is the story of the night he earned the honour.

- - -

It was already pitch-black and freezing outside when First Officer Les Palmer and his colleagues on Coast Guard Cutter Point Henry received a distress call at 4:30 p.m. on Jan. 27, 2004.

The Larissa, a 15-metre shrimping boat, had capsized off the northern coast of British Columbia. As the vessel sank, it sent out an emergency locating signal that reached the Coast Guard's rescue centre in Victoria.

Staff at Victoria paged Mr. Palmer and his shipmates in Prince Rupert with the news: The Larissa was in trouble in nearby Grenville Channel, but nobody knew whether its two-man crew was dead or alive.

Victoria could not reach the fishermen by radio and a winter storm packing 100 knot (185 km/h) winds, thick snow and five-metre waves was pummelling the narrow channel where the Larissa had flipped over. A Canadian Forces Buffalo aircraft from CFB Comox had tried to aid in the rescue, but the treacherous weather forced the plane to turn back.

The fishermen's lives rested with the Point Henry.

After doing their best to chip a 10-centimetre-thick coat of ice from the 23-metre cutter's deck and rails, Mr. Palmer, the Point Henry's captain, its chief engineer and two deckhands sailed south into the heart of the storm.

On the three-hour trip down Grenville Channel the crew had a stroke of good luck.

"We talked to a freighter who thought he had noticed a light on the shore," Mr. Palmer said.

The Point Henry plied the waters in the area the freighter pointed out.

They fired illumination flares, lighting up the night sky long enough to elicit a response from the shore of Pitt Island, a rocky land mass across Grenville Channel from the B.C. mainland.

"There was a break in the weather, and we were fairly close to shore. We spotted this flashlight going off," Mr. Palmer said.

Someone was alive on Pitt Island.

Two days earlier, skipper Ray Kevis, then 29, and deckhand Lorne Demeria, then in his early 20s, set off from their homes in Qualicum Beach on Vancouver Island to begin the shrimping season. They were bound for Prince Rupert.

But as the pair steered the Larissa into the southern end of Grenville Channel on the late afternoon of Jan. 27, 2004, hurricane-force winds whipped down from the mountains on the mainland, knocking the Larissa onto its side.

Mr. Kevis and Mr. Demeria crawled out through a side door, climbed onto the boat's bobbing hull and set off their emergency positioning beacon. They scrambled to inflate their orange and black life raft.

"What was going through my mind? Oh shit," Mr. Kevis, a married father of a four-year-old daughter, said. "What are we going to do to make this situation better?"

What happened next made the situation worse. The life raft flipped as Mr. Kevis and Mr. Demeria tried to jump in, and Mr. Kevis had to dive back into the freezing water to right it.

"Somehow in that excitement I wound up tangled in the line that goes from the boat to the life raft. My only way of getting untangled was to drop my pants," he said. The air temperature was -40 C.

Eventually, the fishermen made it to Pitt Island, where they slipped into their water-logged wetsuits and turned the life raft into a makeshift shelter.

Huddled inside, they turned on their flashlight and pointed its beam into the driving snow.

Mr. Palmer and the crew of the Point Henry couldn't land at the spot where they had seen the faint beam of the fishermen's flashlight. The sea was too rough and the snow was like a curtain.

They sailed to a safer point about a half-kilometre south. Armed with hot coffee and a hypothermia treatment kit, Mr. Palmer and rescue specialist Bill Robb hopped into the cutter's 4.5-metre Zodiac motor boat and drove towards Pitt Island's shore.

One of the men had to drive the Zodiac back; the other would have to hike through the storm to save the fishermen.

Mr. Palmer, a married father of two grown sons and 21-year veteran of the Coast Guard, volunteered to make the trek.

"I knew there were people on the shore. I just felt this adrenaline and knew I had to get going."

Before Mr. Palmer left, he and Mr. Robb worked out a crude communication system.

If Mr. Palmer's radio froze, he would use his flashlight to signal the Point Henry. Three steady flashes meant all was well. A series of quick flashes meant trouble.

Wrapped in fleece underwear, an ocean-class suit, two balaclavas, gloves and insulated boots, Mr. Palmer began the 50-minute hike along the ice-covered shore.

The Pacific's icy spray pounded the beach. When the surface became too slippery, Mr. Palmer crawled. He tried trekking through the bush, but the snow was hip-deep and ice-laden branches from the trees kept falling perilously close to him.

For a moment, Mr. Palmer panicked. "I stopped to rest and my frigging eyelids froze together," he said. "I could feel my heart beating in my throat."

Finally Mr. Palmer caught sight of Mr. Demeria standing on the beach waving the flashlight and screaming. It was 11:20 p.m. It had been seven hours since the Larissa had capsized.

Mr. Kevis was semi-conscious inside the life raft. He had injured his hip and face while on Pitt Island's rocky beach and the water in his rubber wetsuit was forcing his body temperature dangerously low.

"He wasn't talking. But I would pinch or rub him and he would moan," Mr. Palmer said.

Mr. Palmer used heat packs, spare gloves and blankets from his hypothermia kit to warm Mr. Kevis.

Realizing he needed more gear and a dry suit for the rapidly deteriorating fisherman, Mr. Palmer radioed the Point Henry to request more supplies.

It was the last message he transmitted before his radio froze.

Fortunately, Mr. Palmer's radio still picked up transmissions from the Point Henry. "We just weren't sure if he could hear us," Mr. Robb said.

The crew tried three times to shoot a pack of back-up supplies onto the beach with a line-rocket gun. Each time the survival package disappeared into the stormy sea.

The Coast Guard crew decided to float the water-proof survival pack and new suit to shore; it landed near the place Mr. Palmer had first embarked from the Zodiac.

He trekked back through the storm, retrieved the pack and returned to the life raft. With trembling, half-frozen hands he drew his pocket-knife and cut Mr. Kevis out of his soaked suit.

A second Coast Guard ship arrived around 3:30 a.m. Its crew ferried Mr. Kevis to safety in Prince Rupert. He and Mr. Demeria were treated and released from hospital the same day.

"I think it's great that Les is getting [the Cross of Valour]," Mr. Kevis said yesterday. "If it wasn't for him, we wouldn't be here."

kpatrick@nationalpost.com


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