3 Mass. hikers rescued from N.H. mountains in separate operations

Three Massachusetts hikers were rescued from New Hampshire mountains over Labor Day weekend in three separate incidents, including one who was flown to the hospital by helicopter, authorities said. 

The first rescue occurred around 12:30 p.m. Sunday, when the New Hampshire Fish and Game Department was notified of an injured hiker near the summit of Mount Monadnock, the department said in a statement.

Conservation officers, Monadnock State Park staff, the Upper Valley Wilderness Response Team, and other hikers helped provide aid to the 53-year-old Brookline woman, authorities said. 

Rescuers carried the woman —who suffered serious but not life-threatening injuries — to the base of the mountain, Fish and Game officials said. 

Authorities did not specify what caused the woman’s injuries, but noted she and her hiking companions were “well prepared for a day of hiking on the mountain.”

Mount Monadnock is a 3,165-foot peak in Jaffrey, a town in southwestern New Hampshire.  

Around 4 p.m. Sunday, conservation officers received a report of another injured hiker near the summit of Mount Osceola in the White Mountain National Forest, according to a statement from Fish and Game. 

A 57-year-old North Reading man slipped on a muddy section of the trail while descending from the summit, conservation officers said. After he was injured, his family called 911, and other hikers helped stabilize him and guided his family back down the trail as he waited for rescuers.

Conservation officers and members of the Pemigewasset Valley Search and Rescue Team carried the man to the trailhead, where he reunited with his family and returned home in his personal vehicle, according to Fish and Game. 

The man told authorities he planned to seek medical care at an emergency clinic the following day. 

The third rescue took place Monday afternoon on the Glen Boulder Trail in the White Mountains, where a 79-year-old Hopkinton man was injured about four miles from the nearest parking lot, Fish and Game officials said. 

Around 2:30 p.m., a friend called 911 to report that the man had fallen and suffered a head and neck injury. The man was unable to move and had lost feelings in his extremities, conservation officers said. 

Because of the reported injuries and the hiker’s distance from medical care, Fish and Game requested a helicopter from the New Hampshire Army National Guard, authorities said. 

Conservation officers also called in volunteer search-and-rescue teams because high winds could have prevented the helicopter from reaching the hiker. In total, six conservation officers and 24 volunteers from Androscoggin Valley Search and Rescue and Lakes Region Search and Rescue responded, according to Fish and Game. 

While they waited for the copter to arrive, conservation officers guided rescuers up the mountain toward the injured hiker, authorities said.

The helicopter landed near the hiker around 5:30 p.m. Flight medics evaluated him before carrying the hiker to the helicopter in a litter, conservation officers said. 

The helicopter lifted off the ridge around 5:50 p.m. and flew the man directly to Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center in Lebanon, New Hampshire, per Fish and Game. 

“Luckily, the Army National Guard helicopter was able to extract the patient, which saved the rescue crew from an arduous carryout of a patient with a potential life-threatening condition from a very difficult trail,” Fish and Game officials said. 

Such a carryout “would have likely taken all night to complete,” the department added.