Atlantic Charger rescue mission: Canadian Forces detail their role

Shortly after takeoff from Greenwood, N.S. on Monday, Canadian Forces Capt. Jennifer Bass picked up a call from the Joint Rescue Command Centre in Halifax.

A fishing vessel with nine crew members was sinking 200 kilometres southeast of Baffin Island and needed help, and the crew of a CP-140 Aurora aircraft was called in to find them.

• Atlantic Charger's crew rescued from life-raft in Frobisher Bay

"It would have been much closer to open ocean than it would anywhere near land," said Bass, an air combat systems operator.

She relayed the message to the pilot of the Aurora, Capt. Mary Cameron-Kelly.

The surveillance plane travelled for about three and a half hours before spotting the foundering vessel in the frigid Atlantic Ocean.

"I saw the ship listing and the back end was sunk," Cameron-Kelly said. "And when we came back around again, it was totally submerged."

"At that point, the nine members that were reported to us were in the life-raft, and we spotted the life-raft fairly quickly as well."

Cameron-Kelly said she saw the orange raft bobbing in the water as a crew member had put up a yellow flag. All nine members were eventually picked up by a Greenlandic fishing vessel and are now on their way to Newfoundland.

6 women involved in rescue

"We practise for it, and it happened in almost exactly the same way," said Bass, who's based in Greenwood.

It was her first search and rescue mission and a significant one for the Canadian Forces.

"It's probably the first time that we had two women aircraft commanders," Cameron-Kelly said. "There was a Hercules female aircraft commander and myself, which co-ordinated most of the rescue mission." 

Altogether, six women took part in the rescue operation, including Bass, a co-pilot, search and rescue technician and navigator.

"It's nice to see more women involved getting into the trades and getting the experience and helping out because sometimes it can be very rewarding and of course, yesterday was," Cameron-Kelly said.

"It's quite unusual to have six women working together because there are only about 14 or 15 on base," said Bass.

"The more women we can get involved the better, and hopefully it will get to the point that this is a normal thing."