Rope Rescue in Niagara Falls, NY

According to Ontario’s Special Investigation’s Unit, Niagara Regional Police responded to a call at the Hampton Inn on River Rd. at 6:40 a.m. New Year’s Day.

“Officers were dealing with a number of people at the inn in relation to the call,” SIU spokesperson Jasbir Brar said Friday.

“A 23-year-old man separated from the group and later fell into the gorge.”

The man had fallen 45 metres into the gorge near the Niagara Parks Commission’s White Water Walk.

The Niagara Falls Fire Department, Niagara Parks Police and Niagara EMS were involved in the rescue.

“All services worked seamlessly together during this incident,” said deputy fire chief Jim Boutilier.

Once the injured man was located, It took emergency personnel about an hour to retrieve him.

“This area of the gorge is very challenging due to vegetation and steep terrain,” said fire chief Lee Smith.

“Our crews performed extremely well together under difficult circumstances.”

The man, whose name has not been released, was airlifted by an Ornge helicopter to Hamilton General Hospital with serious but non-life threatening injuries.

While there is an elevator at the White Water Walk attraction that leads to a boardwalk at the bottom of the gorge, it was not in operation.

About Author

countyfiretactics

Curt Isakson is a 35 year veteran of the fire service. Curt is currently a Battalion Chief for Escambia County Fire Rescue. Previously worked 9 years with the Pensacola Fire Department where he was assigned as the Company Officer on Rescue 31. Curt’s fire service experiences started at a young age as a Junior firefighter with the Midway Fire Protection District and rose through the ranks to Captain. He has worked in volunteer, career, and combination departments.

Curt has held all ranks up to Battalion Chief and been assigned to operations, training, inspections, and was Chief of Special Operations for 7 years. Curt owns and operates County Fire Tactics that covers a very diverse range of fire service topics, as well as Firefighter Rescues, a site that documents rescues made by firefighters around the country.

He has annual contracts with numerous departments to provide standardized monthly training for these departments that respond daily together under an automatic aid agreement. Curt teaches nationally to include; FDIC, Firehouse Expo, Firehouse World, Orlando Fire Conference, Atlanta Fire Conference, Bowling Green State University, and owns/operates the annual HROC, COBC, WOTF, CFT ODP on Pensacola Beach. He is a Florida Certified Fire Officer, Instructor, Inspector, Arson, and FLUSAR.

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