This Airbus AS350 B3 helicopter flew three rescue missions Sunday in three national parks in Washington state/NPS, Scotty Barrier

There are many days at Mount Rainier National Park when the contracted helicopter they pay $2,900 a day to be available sits idle, glinting in the sunshine. But then there are days like Sunday, when the whirlybird crisscrossed Washington state to perform rescues at three national parks.

"Obviously, we’re not going to have that kind of thing every day," Glenn Kessler, Mount Rainier's aviation manager, said Tuesday during a more typical slow day, rescue-wise. "We don’t have rescues every day. You get your royal flush only once in 500 hands of poker. It happens. Certainly, you get all the pieces happening all the time. Two years ago we had the same thing, but in a full weekend.”

On Sunday the rescues performed at Mount Rainier, Olympic, and North Cascades national parks kicked off about 9 a.m., when the North Cascades National Park Communication Center received a report of an 18-year-old backpacker with breathing problems in the northwest section of the park wilderness.

“The one at North Cascades, with the difficulty breathing, seemed to be possibly an allergy," said Kessler. "When the rangers got on scene they gave him an 'epi' (epinephrine injection) and put him on an IV. I think that might have been (life threatening). The others were not.”

Not that they might not have turned out that way. After the first rescue, the whirlybird was redirected to Olympic National Park, where the crew rescued a 55-year-old man who had gotten lost on June 19 when he went for a day hike. Park rangers contacted the lost hiker at 2:30 a.m. on Sunday. He was too weak to travel, and the ruggedness of the terrain proved very difficult for ground-based rescue. As a result, the helicopter was summoned and the dehydrated hiker was flown to an area hospital.

During the evening flight back home to Mount Rainier, an emergency beacon activation from injured climbers on Mount Rainier's Liberty Ridge was received. After being briefed over the radio about the situation, the flight crew shifted course to perform a reconnaissance at about 9,500 feet on the steep ridge where the climbers waited for rescue. An additional Mount Rainier climbing ranger was picked up to help perform the evacuation of the injured climbers. Just before 9 p.m., the ship landed back at its home base, with the injured climbers.

Kessler said that last rescue was just in the nick of time.

“We didn’t really feel like they were in a life-threatening situation (injury-wise). It was a broken hand and a hurt leg, nothing life-threatening," he said. "The only issue was we had an hour-and-a-half. If we hadn't had gotten them out, very severe weather was coming in. We had 100 mph winds at 10,000 feet that night” along with rain and snow.

While Kessler didn't have an exact dollar figure for what those rescues cost, he noted the $2,900 day fee just to have the helicopter available if needed, flight costs of $900 per hour in the air (they flew about 4.5 hours Sunday), as well as costs for the rangers (hazard pay and any overtime they might have encountered). Plus a mechanic was on standby. Those costs are not passed on to those rescued in the form of bills, he said.

“If we were allowed to, we would, but we’re not allowed to. We serve the public," he said, noting that other public agencies, such as the Coast Guard, don't typically charge for rescues.

Traveler postscript: Mount Rainier began its helitack program in 2015 when it initiated a 120-day annual exclusive use contract for an Airbus AS350 B3 helicopter to allow Mount Rainier climbing rangers to perform short-haul helicopter rescue operations. Mount Rainier, North Cascades, and Olympic national parks now share a dedicated short-haul rescue helicopter on contract for the summer season. The parks’ exclusive use rescue helicopter is owned, piloted, and maintained by Helicopter Express, Inc., based in Chamblee, Georgia. This coverage is in addition to the National Park Service’s longstanding relationship with the U.S. Army Reserve, Navy, Coast Guard, and Air Force which also perform helicopter rescues in the parks and served as contingency resources during the recent rescues.

The Park Service utilizes helicopter search-and-rescue for those cases demanding this specialized resource. Far more ground-based searches and rescues occur at national parks every year than those in which helicopters are employed. In the 24-hour period during which the most recent helicopter rescue took place, several other ground-based personnel-intensive rescues were also successfully accomplished in these parks.

“I’m proud of the way our parks are working together as evidenced by this past weekend’s successful outcomes,” said Mount Rainier Superintendent, Chip Jenkins. “This happens through hard work and time spent together building skills and relationships.”