The devastating mudslide in Oso, Wash., destroyed dozens of homes, killed at least 24 people and left nearly 200 people unaccounted for. But many were able to escape from the tragic event, thanks to rescue teams' heroic efforts, including a particularly dramatic save captured on camera.
A video released by Snohomish County's Helicopter Rescue Team shows workers extracting 4-year-old Jacob Spillers from the second floor of his home, where he had been trapped by the mudslide. The helicopter team was one of the first rescue groups to arrive on the scene in the hours after the mudslide occurred on March 22.
Footage of the rescue shows the helicopter lowering to the debris and rescuers on the ground helping lift the boy into the chopper.
"He was stuck. He was sunk into that mud so well that his pants came right off," Ed Hrivnak, a member of the Pierce County Fire and Rescue team, told a local news outlet. "The mud had compacted around him and had created such suction that he couldn't move."
The boy's father, Billy Spillers, and the boy's three siblings -- half-brother Jovon Mangual, 13, Kaylee Spillers, 5, and Brooke Spillers, 2 -- are still missing, the New York Daily News reports.
“Jacob told me he got out when nobody else was able to get out,” Jovon Mangual's father, Jose Mangual, told The Seattle Times.
Jacob's mother, Jonielle Spillers, who was at work during the incident, tracked her son down by calling area hospitals, per the New York Post.
Rescue teams are still searching for 176 missing people in the rural region hit by the mudslide, according to CNN. However, Washington Gov. Jay Inslee is not optimistic about the reality of finding survivors at this point.
"The force of this landslide just defies imagination. The cars that have been found have been just, literally, twisted into corkscrews and torn in half," he said, per CNN.
Young Boy from Oso from Snohomish HRT on Vimeo.
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