PORT ANGELES — Clallam County Fire District No. 2 crews spent more than four hours getting a dirt biker out of the woods after the man crashed and injured his eye.
The fire district received a report at about 11:45 a.m. Saturday that a dirt biker in his 50s was injured on a trail south of U.S. Highway 101 near the Elwha River, deputy chief Justin Grider said.
Fire crews set up a command center on the highway about a half-mile east of the Elwha River Bridge. Grider said the Clallam County Sheriff’s Office Search and Rescue unit also was called but was not needed.
“We appreciate their availability,” Grider said.
One of the rider’s companions arrived about 10 minutes after firefighters with an all-terrain vehicle and took a fire district paramedic up to the crash site about 2½ miles up a trail.
Grider said there is a network of trails above the highway, and without the friend’s help, firefighters would have had difficulty finding the injured rider.
“We wouldn’t have been able to have found him,” Grider said. “It would’ve taken us a lot longer.”
Grider said a fire district volunteer also brought an ATV to reach the crash site. Personnel couldn’t reach him until about 2 p.m.
The injured man was put on a litter and carried back down the trail in a trailer to the command site, where he was taken by ambulance to Olympic Medical Center.
More information on his condition was not available, but assistant chief Dan Huff said the man was conscious and alert.
Grider said the incident showed the importance of going into the backcountry with companions.
“When people go out in the woods, they should let someone know where they’re at or go with a partner,” he said. “If he had been by himself, who knows how this would have turned out.”
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Sports Editor Pierre LaBossiere can be reached by email at plabossiere@peninsuladaily news.com.
