Chopper hoists stranded paddlers from Tsirku

Three residents plucked from the Tsirku River by a tethered Coast Guard rescue swimmer Sunday said dry suits, life vests and a satellite communication device made the difference between life and death.

“If we didn’t have the safety gear, we definitely would have died,” Shannon Stevens said. “Kayla and I would have died.”

Stevens, brother Erik Stevens and friend Kayla Shutes, all in their thirties, left Sunday morning from LeBlondeau Glacier for a 15-mile float on the Tsirku to a take-out near Chilkat Lake Road.

In two inflatable kayaks and a packraft, they made it past Devil’s Elbow, above the confluence of the Tsirku and Little Salmon rivers, when the Tsirku pushed them into a section of flooded forest.

They portaged their boats to the Little Salmon, a smaller, slower stream. “We were like, ‘Okay, great. We’ll just float out the Little Salmon because this is an easy float and I’ve done this a bunch of times before,” Erik Stevens said.

The smaller river is lower and slower than the Tsirku, but at the confluence of the two rivers, the paddlers navigated a blind corner to find a vigorous rapid and whirlpool against a rock wall and a series of “strainers,” partly submerged logs that can pin boats and trap people.

Due to the blind corner, Erik said they had no idea what was coming. “I was a little complacent… because I felt like I knew it” from several previous trips. The spot is about 21 miles northwest of Haines and a few minutes by boat from the group’s planned take-out.

Going first, Erik’s packraft almost flipped, alarming Shannon and Shutes. As soon as Shannon entered the rapids, her kayak capsized. Tossed from the craft, she swallowed water but grabbed the kayak before noticing a strainer ahead.

“I got to the cliffside shore as quickly as I could and managed to grab onto some roots. Half the roots I would grab onto would just crumble,” Shannon said. In the meantime, Shutes had entered the Tsirku, saw Shannon capsize, and steered her kayak to help. But the forceful current drove her head-on into the strainer.

“My boat turned sideways and got jammed in (the strainer), and I got stuck underneath the log,” Shutes said. She wasn’t sure how she came out the other side. Afloat in the river, she made her way to its bank but was still unable to see Shannon, who was upstream on the same river side.

Shannon, clinging to the steep and crumbling cliff bank, turned and saw Shutes’ boat upside down, pinned by the strainer. “I thought she was under there drowning, and I couldn’t help her,” Shannon said. “I was screaming her name like bloody murder.”

Downstream, on the opposite shore, which was flat and walkable, Erik heard his sister screaming but was unable to see her. He thought she was drowning. “There was no time to realize what was going on.”

Unable to make sense of her shouting, Erik dragged his boat upstream until he could see both women.

The shouting also alarmed Shutes. “I’ve never heard someone scream like that before.” She tried to get to Shannon but was separated by a steep cliffside.

Using hand signals and screaming over the roaring water, the trio eventually recognized they were alive, but trapped. “I was just realizing there is absolutely nothing I can do to help them, and there is absolutely nothing they can do to get out of there,” Erik said.

Using an InReach satellite device, Erik texted friends in Haines around 7:30 p.m., but both were away from their phones, so he pressed “SOS” on the device and texted that a jet boat would be needed as Shannon and Shutes were beneath trees and on a steep embankment at rapids’ edge.

“I remember both Shannon and Kayla yelling back to me, “How are they going to get us with a helicopter? They’re not going to be able to get us. Do they know we need a jet boat?”

They received a message by 9 p.m. that a Coast Guard helicopter was en route. The MH-60 Jayhawk arrived at 10:20 p.m. “When I saw the light of the helicopter, I just started bawling my eyes out,” Shutes said.

A rescue swimmer tethered to the chopper by cable hoisted Erik up into the craft. Then, Erik said, the crew spent time figuring out how to reach Shannon and Shutes. “When it was finally my turn, I was really struggling to see how they were going to get me. There was tree cover all directly over me,” Shannon said.

She became frightened watching the rescue swimmer reeled back up into the helicopter after an unsuccessful first attempt to reach her. On the second attempt, the swimmer was lowered to a spot downstream, and a crew member aboard the chopper steered the cable to the shore. “It was so gnarly,” Shannon said. At one point, she was almost hit by a branch sheared off by rotor wash. The branch smashed her boat.

Getting into the helicopter, Shannon, whose face was splattered with mud, looked like she had just returned from war, Shutes said. The two friends hugged and cried.

The rescue occurred less than a mile from the group’s car. “It was a pretty perfect trip for the vast majority of the time – 99% of it,” Erik said.

A Coast Guard press release Tuesday said the three paddlers “were very well prepared,” citing the dry suits, solid communication and a reliable GPS device.

Erik said lessons learned included keeping the satellite device attached on your person. His device was in his boat, which fortunately wasn’t lost before the rescue. “The rotor wash was so powerful that it just picked up my boat and my gear – a 60-pound boat full of my backcountry gear – and it just picked it up like a napkin and tossed it 100 feet downstream.”

The packraft full of gear was recovered by river guides and returned to Erik Wednesday. The two blue, yellow and gray kayaks and a yellow dry bag are still missing.

Erik posted a warning on Facebook about the dangerous river condition. “I’m absolutely terrified that someone else is going to float the Little Salmon this week while the river is still doing what it’s doing,” he said.

Erik said he has pack-rafted for about five years. “I’ve been pretty cautious. I don’t seek out white water. That’s not my approach.” Prior to the trip, the trio abandoned plans to float the Katzehin last weekend due to reports of unsafe river conditions.

River tour operator Andy Hedden described the Tsirku as “a Class I river with Class V consequences.” It’s notorious for logjams and for being unpredictable, he said.