Rescue group finds hiker on Katahdin

BAXTER STATE PARK — Members of the Dirigo Search and Rescue Association assisted members of the Baxter State Park staff Saturday morning in rescuing a woman with a broken ankle from Mount Katahdin on the Northwest Peaks Trail above Russell Pond.

With doubts about accessibility by helicopter, David Martin, president of the search and rescue group, said the Dirigo and Lincoln rescue squads climbed to the accident site and carried the woman about a mile or so to a location where a helicopter could reach her.

Members of the National Guard Medevac 112th responded with the helicopter.

Martin said his brother, Al, was the on-the-scene leader of the Dirigo effort. “We had 19 people up there,” said Martin. Twelve of them were members of the explorer club in Bangor sponsored by the association. The Lincoln group provided six volunteers.

On hearing of the accident Friday night park officials decided they couldn’t do anything to rescue the woman until Saturday morning. “We went up early Saturday morning and assisted,” he said.