The wreckage of a vehicle is seen near the Angeles Crest Highway after a crash on Sunday, Aug. 9, 2015. (Credit: Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department)
Posted 7:35 PM, August 9, 2015
by John A. Moreno
A car plummeted down an embankment Sunday morning in the Angeles National Forest, prompting the rescue of two people, one of whom was found by a news photographer after emergency responders left the scene, officials said.
The Los Angeles County Fire Department at 9:54 a.m. responded to a report that a vehicle had veered off the Angeles Crest Highway near mile marker 38, according to a news release. Fire Department personnel arrived in the area and, at mile marker 40, discovered a car more than 400 feet below the road.
One of the vehicle’s two occupants was airlifted to a trauma center, the statement said.
The second person had exited the car before firefighters arrived and was nowhere to be seen. Search and rescue teams from the county fire and sheriff’s departments, using K-9 units, “covered a large area deep in the canopy-covered drainage, looking for the second patient,” but were unsuccessful, officials said.
After the departure of the rescue vehicles, a news photographer heard a male voice coming from deep within the canyon: “Help. Is anyone there?”
Cellphone service was not available in the area, so the photographer used the two-way radio in her work van to contact her newsroom, the news release said. Her colleagues contacted the Fire Department, and rescue units returned to the scene.
The second patient was then airlifted to a hospital. The conditions of both victims was not immediately known.