The Cold War Evolution of the
Rescue Service – Civil Defense Rescue
In 1959, the squad became the
Civil Defense Rescue Service with Gene Glaze serving as the first Chief of
Operations, supported by Dave Evans as Chief of Administration. Paul and
Jeanette Wilkerson were key members of the squad at this point and Paul remains
a respected member to this day. During the first year, the squad expanded
services to five dedicated rescue divisions in an effort to improve
effectiveness and response time. The five divisions were Marine Rescue,
Underwater Rescue, Cave/Cliff Rescue, Air Rescue and General Rescue. The
volunteers of these units continued to respond to a high volume of emergencies
throughout the 1960’s due to the strong influence of the Tennessee Civil
Defense Agency and a continued lack of organized local government emergency
services.

In the early 1960’s the
Cave/Cliff Unit was officially formed by avid caver and squad member, Don
Black. The first official response of the Cave/Cliff Unit was the recovery of a
victim who fell 281 feet to his death in Mystery Falls Cave on Lookout
Mountain. This proved a significant achievement by the squad considering in the
early 1960’s the use of ropes for exploration of vertical caves was in its
earliest stages and rope techniques were still developing and unproven. The
Cave/Cliff Unit was involved in a number of harrowing cave rescues during the
60’s including a successful three day search of Case Cave on Lookout Mountain
in April 1962 for three students. The Cave/Cliff Unit was called on again in
April 1966 to rescue a group of Boy Scouts trapped in Howards Waterfall Cave
after an explosion of gas fumes was caused by the group’s carbide lanterns. The
incident left three cavers dead. Victims recalled that the explosion was so hot
that it burned their clothes off and residents of nearby Trenton, GA could hear
the explosion from many miles away. An investigation into the cause of the
explosion discovered a ruptured fuel tank at a nearby gas station had leaked
gasoline into the cave. Don Black went on to become the Chief of the Rescue
Service and with his leadership the Cave/Cliff Unit evolved into a widely
respected entity providing cave rescue services to the entire southeastern
United States.
Another incredible incident on March 2nd,
1960 is credited to Mother Nature and is remembered by an entire generation of
Chattanooga residents as “The Great Ice Storm of 1960”, arguably the worst ice
storm ever recorded
in the Scenic City. Squad members battled their way up
mountain roads to the communities of Signal and Lookout
Mountain while the
snapping of trees reported like artillery fire all around them. Paul Wilkerson
recalls responding to a call on Prentice Cooper for a pregnant lady in labor
distress during the ice storm. Wilkerson remembers the hours of effort it took
his team to clear the road of downed trees to reach their patient. Trees
snapped in half from the weight of accumulated ice and fell in front and all
around the rescuers as they were clearing the road. At times, Wilkerson and his
team feared their lives would be ended by a falling tree. Upon their return
down the mountain, with patient loaded for transport to the hospital, the team
had to clear the road all over again. Cleanup from this epic storm lasted for
months and squad members were critical in the community’s recovery.
In 1961, the Civil Defense Rescue
Service was designated by the City of Chattanooga and Hamilton County,
Tennessee as an official arm of both governments’ emergency services. Around this
time, the squad began vehicle extrication of victims involved in motor vehicle
accidents. The squad acquired two hydraulic port-a-powers used to force open
doors of wrecked vehicles. Extrication calls became the great majority of the
squad’s emergency responses for the next two decades. The squad received from
Civil Defense the very first set of Hurst extrication tools, better known as
the “Jaws of Life”, in the entire state. At the height of its extrication responsibilities the squad operated four fully
equipped vehicles with Hurst tools and was responding to approximately 600
motor vehicle accidents annually.

In the mid 1960’s the city and
county were dealing with the issue of
substandard ambulance services comprised mainly of local funeral home operators.
In an effort to help mitigate this shortcoming, the squad acquired two Cadillac
ambulances from the nearby Moccasin Bend Mental Hospital in an effort to
improve these deplorable patient care issues by providing free ambulance
services with trained medical technicians. Squad members from this time recall
hearse operators who would leave the scene of an accident if it did not appear
any of the victims would succumb to injuries before reaching the hospital. Wilkerson
recalls hearse operators who would fight over victims of fatal motor vehicle
accidents while ignoring victims who required transport to the hospital. In
late 1969, the Chattanooga Times published a four part series of articles
detailing the horrors of sub-standard patient care provided by funeral home
hearse operators who provided unregulated ambulance services to the community. The
Times articles proved effective in gaining traction for the development of
county managed ambulance services and by the mid 1970’s the squad eliminated
ambulance services due to vast improvements in regulations, patient transport
and care.
April 1965, in the category of
calls too strange to be made up, the squad responded to Marion County at the
request of the Tennessee Highway Patrol to wrangle a 450 pound Grizzly Bear.
The bear, escaped from his pen at a roadside traveling carnival in Marion
County, was found wandering Hwy 41 and scaring motorists. Squad members managed
to “capture the bear” using a 50 foot length of rope and distraction. The bear
was walked grudgingly, putting up quite the fight, back down Hwy 41 to his pen
without incident. A second unusual call in the same year involved an escapee of
the Moccasin Bend Psychiatric Hospital who attempted escape by navigating the
Tennessee River on a log. The escape attempt necessitated a rescue when the
escapee became stranded on Williams Island near Baylor School.
State Charter – Chattanooga Hamilton County
Rescue Service
The squad was officially chartered by the
State of Tennessee as the Chattanooga – Hamilton County Rescue Service on
August 12, 1965. CHCRS members who signed the charter document included Gene
Glaze, Dave Evans, Don Black, C Robert Clark, Fred Morrison and Paul Wilkerson.
This act dissolved the squad’s ties to the Tennessee Civil Defense Agency and
allowed us to become an independent non-profit corporation. CHCRS continued to
demonstrate our commitment to providing exemplary emergency services to the
City of Chattanooga and Hamilton County and in the 1960’s, 70’s and 80’s
expanded services to include Wildland Fire Fighting and Mobile Rehab Services.
During the 1980’s, the city and
county made considerable advances in organized emergency response by
establishing the Hamilton County Office of Emergency Management. The goal of
this office was to implement a five year plan to improve emergency services in
Hamilton County. On November 4th 1987, the County Commission
approved the creation of the Hamilton County EMS to provide Advanced Life
Support ambulance services to the Scenic City. In addition, the Chattanooga
Fire Department began an effort to strategically place vehicle extrication teams
across the city to provide better response times to motor vehicle accidents.
During this initiative, CHCRS members were instrumental in training the CFD in
the techniques of vehicle extrication. The expansion of
emergency services from the paid government funded agencies in the city and
county inevitably led in the decrease in call volume for CHCRS headed into the
1990’s. The squad would need to reinvent itself in order to remain relevant in
an era of well-funded government emergency agencies.

During the 1990’s additional
services included Trench Rescue and Hazmat response. CHCRS continued to evolve
to provide valued services to the community and many high profile rescues
furthered the squad’s reputation as a professional volunteer organization. The
Cave/Cliff Unit had become known as the premier cave rescue team in North
America and boasted quite a collection of talented individuals. Many unique
situations required the technical expertise of CHCRS in this decade and the
squad’s volunteers were always ready to respond to any challenge.
In December 1990, CHCRS provided
extrication services in the aftermath of the worst traffic accident in
Tennessee history that resulted in a 125 car pile-up and the death of 15 people
on 1-75 just north of Chattanooga. Agencies from all over the region
participated in the effort to rescue victims from the chain reaction accident
caused by heavy fog. Coincidentally, CHCRS responded to a second 75 car pile-up
on I-75 south of Chattanooga in March 2002 that claimed the lives of five.
CHCRS Gains National Exposure - Cave/Cliff
Rescue
In April 1991, members of the
Cave/Cliff Unit were asked by the National Park Service to assist in the rescue
of Emily Mobley Davis from Lechuguilla Cave. The four day evacuation of Davis
from 1,565 vertical feet underground became national news and Captain Buddy
Lane and Lieutenant Dennis Curry were heralded as local heroes. The Lechuguilla
Cave rescue is still the deepest cave rescue in U.S. history and CHCRS members
played pivotal roles in the successful response.
On August 15, 1992, CHCRS responded to
Nickajack Cave once again to participate in the recovery of a
man assumed to
have drowned while diving in the cave. Cave/Cliff Unit Captain Buddy Lane and
Lieutenant Dennis Curry petitioned TVA to open the flood gates at the Nickajack
Dam in an effort to lower the lake level which floods the cave. After the lake
level lowered over 13 inches, Lane and Curry entered the flooded cave with
flotation and shortly after located David Gant in a small air-bell clinging to
life. The resulting rescue became widely known as the “Miracle at Nickajack
Cave” and furthered the Cave/Cliff Unit’s reputation as a world class cave
rescue team.

In May 1997, the Cave/Cliff Unit responded to
a flooded McBrides Cave in Alabama to rescue a well-known caver who had
suffered a broken femur in a fall. The rescue spanned 18 hours with many flood
pulses continuously forcing rescuers to take refuge in areas above the water
level. Determined CHCRS rescuers worked in a dangerous environment with the
potential for flood waters to trap or kill rescuers in an effort to bring the
injured caver out the lower entrance of the cave alive. The rescue required
every cave rescue agency in the southeast and the resulting effort received
national recognition and was re-enacted some years later for National
Geographic.
The training and determination of
CHCRS members in Trench Rescue was put to the test on a bitter cold evening in December
1998 when Darby Patrick was trapped in a deep trench under 15 feet of dirt. Completely
buried for over four hours, rescuers worked tirelessly to uncover Darby. The
resulting rescue lasted nearly 15 hours and was heralded as a miracle, but the
determined effort of CHCRS rescuers was no miracle. Patrick would survive his
ordeal and the story of his survival against such great odds was publicized
nationally and re-enacted on the Discovery Channel. CHCRS members designed and
deployed a homemade warm air inhalation unit, the first of its kind, that
allowed medics to maintain the patient’s core temperature and likely saved his
life.
The Post 9/11 and Katrina Evolution of CHCRS
The 21st century brought Hurricane
Katrina and the post-9/11 period where unified response to natural disasters
and terrorist attacks would be coordinated, well-funded operations with federal
government oversight. This initiative allowed considerable federal funding to
fire and emergency services and this indirectly had a negative effect on volunteer
agencies such as CHCRS. The additional funding and resources allowed the
government fire agencies to further expand their services to cover incidents within
the city limits. Other services such as Trench Rescue and Medical First
Response were absorbed by the city and county fire services. In response, CHCRS
decided to start
pairing down services to focus on cave rescue, rope rescue,
wilderness extrication and rehab services.
In 2011 and 2013, CHCRS was
heavily involved in two of the most intensive cave rescues in American history.
The rescue of an injured caver in Sinking Cove Cave lasted over 30 hours, required
113 rescuers and involved moving the patient up nine pits and canyons totaling
460 vertical feet to reach the surface. This rescue required intensive
modifications to the cave to accommodate a packaged patient and considerable
medical intervention from CHCRS medical staff. The 2013 rescue of a critically
injured caver with a skull fracture and broken femur from Ellison’s Cave took
23 hours and required hauling the patient up the deepest vertical shaft in
North America at 586 feet. The rescue required every cave rescue agency in the
region and over 100 rescuers total. Again, extensive medical intervention
provided by CHCRS medics allowed rescuers the necessary time to extract the
patient from the cave and ultimately saved his life. Both of these monumental
rescue efforts were realized by utilizing volunteer rescue agencies, proving
that even in the 21st century, volunteer rescue squads can provide
skilled, professional rescuers capable of serving the community.

Today, the Chattanooga – Hamilton County
Rescue Service still operates as a resource of the City of Chattanooga and
Hamilton County Tennessee. CHCRS is a 501c3, non-profit organization, solely
comprised of volunteers, which operates on donations received from the
community. CHCRS continues to provide valuable professional services to the
citizens of Chattanooga, Hamilton County and the surrounding Tri-State area.
Our Support Services provides rehab, 4x4 transportation, portable light trucks
and standby services to the communities and agencies requiring our support. The
Cave/Cliff Unit provides rope rescue, cave rescue, SAR and confined space
rescue services to any agency, state or country that requests our response. The
Cave/Cliff Unit has responded to cave accidents in Tennessee, Alabama, Georgia,
North Carolina, Virginia, Kentucky and New Mexico.
Over our nearly 80 year history, CHCRS
members have been instrumental in the development of rescue techniques and
training of rescue personnel. We continue that tradition today with many of our
members recognized as leaders and innovators in their respected fields. CHCRS
members are comprised of a highly respected emergency medicine physician with
extensive experience in Wilderness Medicine, over 30 licensed medical
professionals, many SPRAT certified rope access professionals, NCRC
instructors, Swiftwater Rescue instructors, CPR and BLS instructors,
firefighters and police officers. The squad continues to train and work closely
with other agencies and professional organizations to further the cause founded
by the first members in 1937, which was “We volunteer because we care”. The
strength of the Chattanooga – Hamilton County Rescue Service is found in our
achievements and in the continued dedication of our professional volunteer
rescuers.
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