AUGUST 2019 FLYINGMAG.COM | 45riding in a CalStar EMS helicopter
over the Tahoe backcountry—not far
from Desolation Wilderness—inbound
to a hospital with a critically injured
patient on board. Though a life of
EMS helicopter rescue was my dream,
somehow I'd found myself in the
wrong place in that EC 135. Strapped
half-lifeless to a backboard, I was the
critically injured patient with a cervi-
cal collar around my neck, mild hypo-
thermia, a broken back and a severed
spine—and no feeling or movement
below my bellybutton. Though my
eyes were wide open, I was plunged
into a nightmare.
Straining my vision beyond the head
restraints, I could see a man in the
pilot seat. Through the chaos— triaging
flight nurses, veins being stabbed
with needles—I was hyper aware of
the pilot’s cyclic and subtle collective
movements. I could see his mastery of
the controls, his calm execution, his
life-empowering passion. I was wit-
ness to his greatness. He was living his
truth—and I was now a million miles
away from mine, tears streaming down
my face in silent horror.
From the back of that CalStar
Eurocopter, I couldn’t see where we
were going. The fracture to my soul,
the result of a lifeless lower body, felt
equal to a heart that was breaking as
each nautical mile toward our desti-
nation passed. This could not be real.
My wings were clipped; my life’s path
erased. My higher self was shattered.
I don’t remember much about
the nine days my family and friends
spent with me in the ICU. I have a
few soul-crushing memories from
my time there and on the neurol-
ogy f loor. Mostly, I remember facing
rock bottom in the in-patient rehab
hospital. Ten days after suffering a
paralyzing snowmobile injury—pain-
fully chronicled in my first book, Two
Feet Back—I awoke, lucid and fully
aware. I was given a room with a view
of the very helicopter landing pad I'd
arrived on weeks prior. This particu-
lar room did not have a TV, but I could
watch heroes working right outside
my window helping others in need.
With every life I saw saved, my con-
viction grew deeper. Without moving
legs, my practical test would be can-
celed. Shawna picked up the phone
and called Matt to tell him, “Grant’s
not going to take that check ride—yet.”
Years went by—daydreaming,
believing, never giving up, but living
a reality a million miles away from
my “truth” as an aviator. Drawing on
a lifetime of seeing the good in things
and choosing positivity over the over-
whelming shouts of opposition, my
recovery period began. Just inside two
years of six-days-a-week, 10-hour days
of physical therapy with my wife andthe Spine Nevada physical therapy
team, I would go on to attempt the
impossible. With a goal to push myself
to the edge of my physical capacity to
heal and recover, I would attempt to
become the first person with a spi-
nal cord injury to ski the final degree
of latitude to Antarctica’s geographic
South Pole. I would do this in an effort
to raise funds and awareness for the
High Fives Foundation, a nonprofit
group that acts as the “safety net for
adventure athletes” to pay for recov-
ery costs beyond what insurance
will cover. This Antarctic expedition
went on to become the multi-award-
winning documentary film The Push,
now available on Netf lix.
Not long after returning home from
Antarctica, fate would find me back
in Rick Lee’s cockpit. Moments after“ He was living his truth—and I was now
a million miles away from mine, tears
streaming down my face in silent horror.”