\tShortly after a helicopter dropped them off in separate locations, the weather turned, making it too dangerous to return. Bull and Gillis spent the night alone in the cold, whipping rain and murky fog.<\/p>\n
\tThe next day, as bad weather continued, the volunteer Alaska Mountain Rescue Group (AMRG) was asked to help. Upon receiving the call, St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Church parishioner and expert mountain-climber Greg Bragiel suited up and headed into the wilderness.<\/p>\n
\tBragiel\u2019s team \u2014 assigned to locate Gillis \u2014 took a helicopter as far up the mountain as possible. Flying into wild weather can be the most dangerous part of a rescue mission, Bragiel told the Catholic Anchor in a recent interview.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cYou could barely see anything\u201d that day, he said. On the choppy flight, \u201cI was saying my prayers\u2026and making the Sign of the Cross both for myself and for the people I was with and for the helicopter pilot and that the person that we were going to look for up by Portage was still alive and safe.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tWhen the helicopter could go no farther, the rescuers were dropped off to hike in the rest of the way. They climbed about 2,000 feet, into the night. The next day they found Gillis, cold but uninjured. The rescuers fortified him with dry clothes and food and fluids, and then they led him down the mountain to the helicopter pick-up point \u2013 and to safety.<\/p>\n
\tMountaineering for God<\/p>\n
\tFor Bragiel climbing high-angle cliffs and sifting through avalanche-covered mountainsides to find those \u201c\u2018lost sheep\u2019 and bring them back to their families,\u201d as he put it, is spiritual work.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cI know I\u2019m here on earth to know, love and serve my creator, and secondarily to help other people. I\u2019m just using the things that I know and my skills to do that,\u201d he observed.<\/p>\n
\tBragiel is demure about his death-defying works of mercy. He acknowledges only that he has \u201csome skills\u201d which some others don\u2019t have \u2014 namely, specialized mountaineering skills honed across years climbing the cliffs and crags of Alaska\u2019s mountain ranges.<\/p>\n
\tIn 2005 he joined the Anchorage Mountain Rescue Group, a non-profit volunteer search and rescue organization. Its members search for people who are lost, injured or stranded in Alaska\u2019s backcountry \u2013 and if necessary they retrieve the bodies of the deceased. Their missions involve lost hikers, hunters and children, those fallen on mountainside cliffs, buried in avalanches and trapped in crashed planes.<\/p>\n
\tThis summer Bragiel and his fellow rescuers took part in the effort to find the missing Michael LeMaitre, a runner in the Mount Marathon race, bushwhacking through the woods and brush on the famous mountain in Seward.<\/p>\n
\tAs with his teammates Bragiel is on-call 24 hours a day. Additionally he is the group\u2019s equipment manager and board member. \u201cI\u2019m just a little part of it,\u201d Bragiel insisted.<\/p>\n
\tPhysical and spiritual discipline<\/p>\n
\tAlthough the job is unpaid, Bragiel takes it to heart. In each mission the lives of the stranded as well as fellow rescuers are on the line, he said. So the dentist-by-day regularly trains in the gym and on the mountain, making Bragiel leaner than most 20-year-olds. His close-cropped hair is graying but looks prematurely so. It doesn\u2019t seem possible that he has just turned 60.<\/p>\n
\tIn addition to physical training, Bragiel reviews notes on rescue techniques while at home. It\u2019s about minimizing risk, he explained.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cWe don\u2019t risk lives and put our rescuers at great risk if we know there\u2019s going to be a bad outcome,\u201d he said, adding, \u201cWe don\u2019t want to have more people dead.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tThere isn\u2019t an ounce of bravado in the soft-spoken Bragiel.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cI\u2019ve been in the mountains enough to know what my limits are,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\tA Higher Power<\/p>\n
\tWhen on missions, Bragiel prays \u201cplenty of Our Fathers\u201d and \u201clots of Hail Marys\u201d for those he\u2019s searching for and for the rescuers.<\/p>\n
\tEntrusting her husband to God, Bragiel\u2019s wife Mary Beth prays too.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cI don\u2019t fear for him. When it\u2019s his time to go, it\u2019s his time to go\u2026but I do certainly pray and ask God to protect him and to protect the others,\u201d she said. \u201cI believe that prayers are extremely beneficial and that God listens to all of us, even if things don\u2019t turn out the way we might like them to.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tPhysical and spiritual disciplines help Bragiel do what seems impossible to many \u2014 rescue people deep in the wilderness and in sometimes dangerous, sub-freezing temperatures.<\/p>\n
\tSuch was the case on a frigid day in late February four years ago when three skiers veered off Indian Trail near Girdwood. They had been out for hours. As the light waned and their strength and water supply disappeared, the group was far from home. By the time they called 911, the clouds and wind prevented the state troopers\u2019 helicopter from coming.<\/p>\n
\tDuring a late evening dinner, Bragiel received the page. He and his teammates snowshoed into the dark night searching for the group. Between 2 and 3 o\u2019clock in the morning, the rescuers arrived. They accompanied the desperate skiers down the trail to snowmachines, which then carried them the rest of the way to safety.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cI was really happy to bring people back to their family,\u201d Bragiel recalled. \u201cIt\u2019s pretty easy to lose faith and just give up, and that\u2019s unfortunately what happens with people sometimes. When they\u2019re just exhausted and they\u2019re out of resources and in over their head, they just kind of give up and look for help, and that\u2019s where we are \u2013 to give them that help and that hope.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tBringing the Dead 'Home'<\/p>\n
\tBut sometimes rescues turn into recoveries of the dead. That is an equally necessary job, Bragiel believes. These people need to come \u201chome\u201d too, he explained.<\/p>\n
\tThree years ago Bragiel and his teammates were called to Seattle Creek, near Turnagain Pass, to search for snowmachiners lost in an avalanche. There was too much risk for another avalanche so the rescuers waited more than a week to begin searching. Finally they were able to head in and dig out the deceased from the snowslide.<\/p>\n
\tAnd two years ago Bragiel took part in the well-publicized search for the president of Conoco Philips and his friend killed in an avalanche in Grandview Valley.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cIt took us three full days of probing and searching and poking holes in the snow,\u201d Bragiel said.<\/p>\n
\tGod First<\/p>\n
\tThese are missions Bragiel thinks \u201ca lot about,\u201d he said, hinting at the spiritual and emotional weight of the work. But Bragiel strives to keep his priorities \u2013 God, family and others \u2013 in order.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cEver since I\u2019ve known him, he has talked about the balance of life,\u201d Mary Beth said of her husband.<\/p>\n
\tBragiel believes helping others is just one part of his mission on earth. \u201cThe other part of my faith walk is you go to church and you do Bible study and you spend time with your wife and family,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n
\tThat it all starts with God is evident at the 7 a.m. daily Mass that the Bragiels attend at Holy Family Cathedral in Anchorage.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cWe just get up early and go visit Jesus first and then go do our work,\u201d Bragiel said.<\/p>\n
\tServing others is his way of saying \u201c\u2018Thank you\u2019 to God,\u201d Mary Beth observed.<\/p>\n
\tIn addition to mountain rescues Bragiel volunteers at the Brother Francis Shelter for the homeless, teaches mountain safety and, together with his wife, volunteers for Special Olympics and Marriage Encounter \u2013 a marriage enrichment program.<\/p>\n
\tWhy add dangerous alpine rescues to an already busy schedule? \u201cI\u2019m trying to make God smile,\u201d Bragiel said.<\/p>\n
\tPosted with permission from Catholic Anchor<\/a>, official newspaper of the Archdiocese of Anchorage, Alaska.<\/p>\n