When Manu Kieran-Black decided to go for a pleasant walk along Forresters Beach on February 21, he little suspected he would become an integral part of an emergency rescue operation after a paraglider crashed onto rocks at the northern end of the beach.
“I live in Sydney with my husband, Johnny, and Cavoodle, PJ,” Kieran-Black said.
“My parents live in Lisarow, where I grew up, and we were staying with them when I decided to take a walk around lunch-time with PJ.
“There was no-one on the beach and there wasn’t much of a breeze.
“At 1:40pm, we were about to turn back when I saw a paraglider take off from the cliff at the northern end of the beach and then crash onto the rocks about 500m from where we stood.
“PJ and I ran up the beach and climbed across the rocks to reach a man who was lying face down on a large rock with his parachute still attached.
“The parachute was in the waves and the light breeze was collecting in the chute.”
The unfortunate paraglider had sustained serious injuries in the fall and was on the phone to emergency services when Kieran-Black arrived.
“I could hear the emergency services operator asking for the GPS coordinates,” he said.
“I told the operator that I could use Google Maps to get the coordinates.”
Alarmed that the tide was coming in and the breeze was pulling his parachute towards the sea, Kieran-Black pulled in the parachute, unlatched it from the paraglider and packed it into the parachute bag.
“Once I … knew that he was safe from being pulled into the sea, I called triple 0,” Kieran-Black said.
“I opened up Google Maps on my phone and dropped a pin where we were located – (this) provided the GPS coordinates which I shared with the operator.”
Kieran-Black said emergency teams arrived at 2:15pm but agreed it was too dangerous to carry the injured man over the 100m of rocks to reach the beach.
“At 2:20pm the rescue helicopter arrived but did not retrieve him at this time because he was too close to the cliff,” he said.
“By 2:50pm there were about 15 emergency services including paramedics; I knew that he was in very good hands so PJ and I left the scene at around 3pm.”
After Kieran-Black washed the parachute at his parents’ home, it was collected a week later by a friend of the paraglider and the two men stayed in touch.
“I wanted to share this story because I think it’s important for the Central Coast community to understand and have awareness of what to do in an emergency – particularly how to work out GPS coordinates when you’re in a remote area,” Kieran-Black said.
He also urged paragliders to ensure weather conditions are right before setting off.
Emergency services advised that the paraglider, a doctor, self-diagnosed his injury to a firefighter and paramedic, as a suspected fractured pelvis.
He was assessed and treated on site before being winched up by helicopter and flown to hospital.
Terry Collins