Injured dog, owner airlifted from Makapuu tidepools

This morning at Makapuu tidepools, an injured dog and its owner were rescued by fire department personnel and airlifted to safety in a helicopter.

“The alarm came in at 10:40 a.m., the first unit arrived at 10:48 a.m., and by about 11:30 a.m. the owner and dog were in the helicopter and heading to the landing Zone at Sandy Beach Park,” said Captain Scot Seguirant of the Honolulu Fire Department.

The feet of the dog, a Labrador/ Golden Retriever, were cut up while hiking down the cliff to the tidepools with a man and a woman, and it couldn’t make it back up.

“The dog stopped moving, and they had no way to get the dog out of there,” Seguirant said, adding that the woman climbed back alone and the man waited with his pet for the helicopter, which “was able to land on the rocks” so that the firemen could assist and secure them inside.

“Just like with children, we need to be thoughtful of our pets’ welfare when we’re out and about,” Seguirant said. “Consider what it would do to your feet if you were walking barefoot on hot asphalt on the Makapuu Lighthouse trail, and then down the side of the mountain.”

The dog, the captain added, was “a real service animal with a vest.” Its human escorts were uninjured.

First responders conducted at least two other rescues along Oahu shorelines today.

Around 1:10 p.m., Honolulu Ocean Safety rescued a male, 58, who had been snorkeling off of the Mokulua Islands. “The visitor swallowed water and was brought to shore to where Honolulu Emergency Medical Services took over with advanced life saving treatment and transported the man in serious condition to an emergency room,” Emergency Services Department spokesperson Shayne Enright reported.

Ocean Safety lifeguards also rescued four divers after a 28-foot vessel went adrift off Kaena Point; a fifth diver on shore called 911 at approximately 1:30 p.m., and “Shortly after, Ocean Safety found all four divers and brought them to shore safely,” Enright said.

Honolulu Ocean Safety also responded to a call at the surf break known as “Log Cabins” on the North Shore around 1:00 p.m. for a teenaged free diver. Lifeguards found the diver’s buoy about a mile offshore, and 30 minutes after the start of the search the diver walked out of the water at Sunset Beach “safe and sound,” Enright said.