Snake bite victim winched from boat

A RESCUE helicopter rushed to Waddy Point on Fraser Island early this morning to help a Gladstone man who was bitten on the hand by a sea snake.

A fisherman is winched to safety by the AGL Action Rescue Helicopter off Fraser Island after being bitten by a sea snake.

A RESCUE helicopter rushed to Waddy Point on Fraser Island early this morning to help a Gladstone man who was bitten on the hand by a sea snake.

The AGL Action Rescue Helicopter flew at 5.45am to the man, 26, who had been working on the trawler Addition.

After placing the emergency call the skipper of the Addition motored for nearly 45 minutes to reach Waddy Point and was located anchored 600 metres off the shore.

Enroute communication with the skipper was established on VHF marine channel 9 and via mobile.

Pilot Peter Marris, crewman Gary Craig, rescue crew officer Brent Malden and flight paramedic Kevin Charteris assessed the scene as they approached the vessel.

"The trawler was quite small and had a lot of nets hanging from the booms as well as a number of loose objects on deck, not to mention antennas and masts. The sea swell was around 1.5 metres and the bow of the boat was the only clear area that might have been possible to winch to," Pilot Peter Marris said.

"However, the bow deck was bobbing up and down too much in the swells to safely winch the flight paramedic onto the boat."

The second option was to have the patient transported to the beach in the trawler's small aluminium tender.

The rescue crew decided it was too risky to try to beach the tender due to the rough breaking surf and strong currents combined with the tender's small 15-horsepower motor.

"Consideration was also given to finding another vessel from Orchid Beach to launch, but the sea was even too rough for a larger boat," Mr Marris said.

The rescue team decided to reposition briefly to Orchid Beach Airstrip and together they devised a plan to rescue the patient from the small tender rather than the trawler.

The skipper was instructed to launch their tender and tether it to the stern of Addition with about 50 metres of rope.

The patient was helped into his lifejacket and carefully placed into the tender.

Once the patient was in position, the rescue team approached and placed rescue crew officer Brent Malden into the water adjacent to the small boat.

He swam to the tender and scrambled on board. He briefed the patient, secured the rescue sling and gave the "thumbs up" to the helicopter hovering nearby to commence the winch.

The trawler crew recovered the tender while the flight paramedic assessed the patient in flight.

It appeared the snake had not managed to get a strong bite and while they are highly venomous the victim was suffering from only minor cramping.

His condition was stabilised and he was flown to Hervey Bay Hospital for further observation.

Originally published as Snake bite victim winched from boat