Dramatic Ocean Rescue Captured on Camera
— -- A U.S. Coast Guard helicopter came to the rescue of a group of hikers in Oregon who became stranded on an island of rocks with 15-foot waves crashing around them.
The hikers were climbing the rocks in Fogarty Creek near Depoe Bay, Oregon, Saturday when the incoming tide left them stranded.
“It’s very common for people to walk out at low tide,” Coast Guard Capt. Todd Trimpert said. “When tide comes in, it comes in very rapidly.”
Three of the eight hikers managed to swim to shore on their own, aided by bystanders who formed a human chain to help pull them out of the water.
Video captured by eyewitness Ray Felle shows a line of people with their arms linked trying to reach people in the water.
One of the bystanders reportedly used CPR to revive one of the female hikers.
"If it wasn't for those two guys going out to help and those other three extending their arms, that girl would have surely died,” Felle told ABC affiliate KATU-TV in Portland.
Once the Coast Guard helicopter arrived, the remaining five stranded hikers were pulled up from the rocks and flown to the beach.
One person was taken to a local hospital for treatment, rescue officials told KATU.
