Page 81 - Salvamont_Romania_2021

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Already from the fi rst years of Salvamont’s offi cial existence, for special actions involving
multiple persons or persons with grave injuries, intervention helicopters were given to the
rescue teams. Without having the mountain rescue equipment though, like winches or
stretcher systems, they were used only for transporting the injured and the rescue teams.
The helicopters belonged to the Ministry of Defense and the Ministry of Interior, and most
of the times, before the intervention proper, it was necessary to dismantle the weapons
and other military devices mounted on them fi rst. The fi rst two helicopter interventions took
place in 1971, in the Bucegi Massif, in order to evacuate a group of 11 people with grave
frostbite injuries, saved by Sinaia Salvamontists, and then in Piatra Craiului, to save a
young man fallen in Hornurile Mălăieștilor.
Other rescue operations followed, and despite the fact that the approvals for
aerial interventions came from the highest level, from the Ministry Council, the
helicopters were not used for rescues only, but also for carrying construction
materials for building rescue refuges.
In 1995, at the end of August, the fi rst helicopter mountain rescue
school is organized in the Pietrele lui Solomon area next to Brașov,
among the fi rst graduated fl ying rescuers being: Mircea Opriș
– Salvamont Brașov, and the organizer of this action, Sabin
Cornoiu – Salvamont Gorj, Raul Papalicef – Salvamont Neamț,
Mihai Voinescu – Salvamont Sibiu, Marian Lala – Salvamont
Victoria, Orban Blaziu and few other fearless pioneers for air
support mountain rescues. In the following years other
exercises were organized, with helicopters from the
Ministry of Defense, Ministry of Interior, or private
companies, training for steep slopes rescues,