Man survives 300-foot plunge when pickup goes off cliff

A man was hospitalized Monday with major injuries after he drove off the cliff on New Priest Grade Road and dropped 300 feet into the canyon below, near Groveland. The accident happened just after 9 a.m. The man’s white pickup could be seen by another driver on Old Priest Grade Road on the other side of the canyon, according to the California Highway Patrol. He went off the road about halfway from the top. His pickup came to rest about 200 feet from the bottom of the canyon, said Cal Fire Battalion Chief Keven Patton. Rescuers from Cal Fire’s Tuolumne-Calaveras unit and Tuolumne County Fire climbed and hiked through thick, prickly brush to get to the man. He was conscious, still in his car and described as having musculoskeletal injuries. “The first rescuer crushed his way through the brush until he got to the patient,” Patton said.

“The second team went through with a chain saw and cut a path.” They laid down rope as part of a “plan B” to pull the injured man back up to the road in case there was an issue with doing a helicopter rescue.

 Firefighters stabilized the man and put him a metal basket, then wrapped him in a Bauman Bag, a bag that provides single-point suspension for hoisting the patient back into the helicopter.

 The man was lifted into the Cal Fire helicopter, which took him to Moccasin at the bottom of the road, where he was transferred into a medical helicopter.

It’s unknown what hospital he was taken to and what condition he was in Monday afternoon. A total of 13 fire personnel were on scene for the rescue. One of four engines that responded stayed at the scene after the rescue in case a fire sparked while the two truck hauled the pickup out of the canyon. There is one-way controlled traffic on New Priest Grade Road.