In normal times, MDA has two helicopters on call during every shift: the southern air ambulance based at Sde Teiman outside of Beersheba, and the northern air ambulance based at Poriah Hospital in Tiberias. A third air ambulance is reserved for cases when the helicopter force needs a backup. That Saturday, all three helicopters operated non-stop in the southern district, treating and evacuating 21 severely and critically injured patients. Ambulances and Mobile Intensive Care Unit vehicles awaited them at the hospital landing pads to transfer the casualties to emergency rooms. These ambulances also transferred dozens of other casualties who had arrived in IDF helicopters to the emergency rooms.
The air ambulances are operated by senior and highly experienced paramedics who have undergone special training for this particular role. Usually, MDA air ambulance teams are sent to treat patients who were injured in traffic or work-related accidents that occurred in far-flung locations; in other cases, they might be sent to treat patients who suffered a heart attack or a stroke far from a medical center that can offer specialized treatment, when time is a critical factor to their chances of survival.
Dr Shafir Botner, who directs MDA’s paramedic school, heard the many sirens that Saturday morning, left his home and headed to the MDA station to help out in the affected areas. At that early stage of the morning, he was still unaware of the terrorists’ infiltration into Israel. He spoke with Shimon Alkobi, the District Manager, who asked him to go to Ofakim or Beersheba.
“We arrived at HaNassi Junction,” Shafir recalls. “To our right was Beersheba, and to the other side was Ofakim. I was unsure which direction to turn. I decided that in the event of falling missiles in Ofakim, I wouldn’t be able to help as much, so I turned towards Beersheba. That was the first time my life was saved that day, because as it turned out, at that time, the terrorists had already taken up positions at the entrance to Ofakim and were shooting at everyone passing by on the road. If I had continued in that direction, I would probably have been shot and perhaps killed.”
Shafir arrived at the Beersheba MDA station and began to help the teams there, but after a short while, he received a phone call. “They asked me to go to the helicopter landing pad at Sde Teiman, to operate a third air ambulance with Rami Miller, the head of the Medical Division and MDA’s Chief Paramedic. The two other air ambulances – one of them operated by our colleagues at the southern landing pad, Ziv Shapira and Moshe Salah – were already working and treating the wounded non-stop, and by now, our help was needed. We left everything and headed straight for the landing pad. We entered the helicopter to prepare it. I arrived with Rami Miller and Dr Refael Strugo, MDA’s Medical Deputy Director General. Within minutes, we were ready and started receiving casualties, and from that point, we treated and evacuated patients in one long shift that began on Saturday morning and only ended on Monday.
“There are a few memories that stand out. On one of the many occasions when evacuating the wounded to Barzilai Hospital in Ashkelon, the siren sounded, and we couldn’t get to a bomb shelter in time, so we lay on the ground in accordance with the instructions. Suddenly, a woman who was highly distressed ran to us with a baby in her arms; she was screaming. She had arrived at the emergency room with her son, who had been injured during one of the previous sirens when she hadn’t managed to reach a bomb shelter in time. She was helpless. It was incredible to see how instinctively we all physically protected her.”
During one of the evacuation flights, a piece of shrapnel from one of the missiles hit the helicopter’s rotor. For a moment, the team was afraid they would die and reported over the radio – “We’ve been hit.” But luckily – and thanks to the pilot’s skill – the helicopter landed safely with limited damage. Moments later, Shafir discovered that the report they had radioed in had been heard by hundreds of terrified MDA workers and had even reached his family. “We were supposed to transfer three wounded people from Barzilai to another hospital. We were in the air ambulance with the wounded who were strapped in and being treated; the motor was on full power, and we were taking off when suddenly we heard a siren and a huge explosion. It’s difficult to explain how terrifying that moment was. I was sure we’d been hit – that’s how it felt. I reported on the radio that we’d taken a hit.” While trying to treat the casualties in the helicopter, the pilot was able to carefully power down the motor. “We understood that we were not yet out of danger – we were worried that at any moment the helicopter could catch fire. We got out and evacuated the wounded to protect them. We later understood that the rotor had been hit by shrapnel. When I finally had a chance to look at my phone, I saw that my daughter had tried to reach me numerous times. She’s an MDA volunteer and heard that a helicopter had been hit; she knew I was on an air ambulance shift and was, of course, alarmed.
“One of the casualties we treated was a police officer who had fought in a battle near the music festival, who had been shot in the abdomen. He was very severely wounded and had lost a great deal of blood and was close to losing consciousness. He asked me if he was already dead. I told him he was alive. I calmed him. Then he said: “Save me, I have kids.” Of course, I did everything I could for him, as I did for everyone I treated. I fought to save him with all the means I had at my disposal, and I hoped for the best. I didn’t know what happened to him afterward. Recently, my brother-in-law, who is also in the police force, told me about a colleague of his who had been severely wounded and was looking to make contact with the medical team who had treated him. I looked into it, and it was indeed the same person I’d treated. He had survived and I had the fortune of meeting him. There’s no greater privilege.”
“The wounded we treated are a kind of microcosm of the disaster that occurred that day. We treated a young woman who was seriously injured at the music festival; a police officer who had been hit by an RPG; someone else who was shot in the stomach. One after the other, like in some sort of horror movie,” Shafir says. “And all the while, missiles were flying over our heads.
“On the flight back, I looked around. I felt like I was in a war movie. The floor of the helicopter was covered in blood; we flew above plumes of smoke and explosions; the sirens wailed the entire time. It was a very strange experience.
“That night, we treated a very severely wounded soldier who was bleeding from everywhere; he was losing all his blood. Another two soldiers who had sustained gunshot wounds arrived with him: one had been shot in the leg and one in the arm. They lingered momentarily before we got to the helicopter; I urged them to hurry up so that we could get on with evacuating the other soldier as quickly as possible. Suddenly, the soldier with the bullet in his leg started running – faster than I could – and said to me: “If it’s urgent, it’s urgent.” We landed at Hadassah Hospital, and in order to save time, the injured soldiers carried the stretcher with their injured friend on it together with us. I looked at them: one soldier with a tourniquet and a bullet in his leg, the other with a tourniquet and multiple bullets in his arm, and yet both of them were carrying their wounded friend so as not to waste a single moment, in such a clear show of camaraderie and dedication. It was extraordinary. I came out of the experience with the understanding that the soldiers who fought on that Saturday were super-human. Superheroes. One just has to look at them to understand what the slogans “Am Yisrael Chai” (the people of Israel live) and “Beyachad Nenatze’ach” (together we will win) are about – because all the cliches are true of these people,” Shafir concludes.
“I was deeply moved; I didn’t stop thinking about you for a moment”
Two and a half months later, two of the casualties who were treated by a medical team from the Sharon District and later by Shafir and Rami from the air ambulance team, paid a visit to the MDA helicopter landing pad to meet with the MDA personnel who saved their lives.
Two police officers from the Segev Shalom police station – Chief Inspector Or Yosef, the station’s operations officer, and Chief Inspector Yoni Desklo, an intelligence officer – were severely wounded during the fighting on October 7.
They both arrived at the MDA’s southern helicopter landing pad. “At the entrance to Kibbutz Re’im, we heard a very powerful explosion and immediately understood that we must have been hit by an RPG,” Chief Inspector Yoni Desklo recalls. “We knew that if we stayed inside our vehicle, we would die, so we decided to get out and find shelter and fight the terrorists from there. During that battle, we were injured by gunshots and shrapnel. I sustained a gunshot wound to the stomach, and Or was injured in his limbs.”
“We managed to get out of there and escape in the direction of Ofakim, where we stopped and flagged down the Mobile Intensive Care Unit passing by,” says Chief Inspector Or Yosef. “It stopped next to us, and Nissim the paramedic ran towards us and immediately treated us and got us into the MICU vehicle.”
MDA paramedic Nissim Sassi spoke about when he met Or and Yoni. “Soon after we began treating you, we brought you on board the MICU, and I immediately radioed the MDA dispatch center to update them about your situation. I knew that in the state you were in, you needed to be hospitalized as soon as possible, so I requested that an MDA air ambulance meet us at Kama Junction. During the evacuation, Yoni said to me that he was going to die. I held his hand and replied to him: ‘You’re not dying here. Not on my watch.’ Seeing you both here today, both of you up on your feet, demonstrates to me how important it was to fight for your lives. I was worried about you at the time, and I’m deeply moved to meet you both now.”
“We landed the helicopter in the Beit Kama area, and immediately after landing, we met up with the MICU. We quickly transferred you to the helicopter, knowing that every second counted, and that you needed to be flown as soon as possible to the hospital,” says Dr Shafir Butner, Director of the MDA Paramedics’ School. “Those moments were critical in the battle for your lives.”
Air ambulance paramedic and MDA’s Director of Medicine Rami Miller concluded: “We fight for every patient. Any thoughts on who will or won’t survive is outside of our calculations. In this case, it was a real fight for the lives of our patients, and today, months after that Black Saturday, when we fought to save Yoni and Or, I’m deeply moved to be here with you, brave police officers, who were severely injured and now are on your feet and smiling. It’s touching. I haven’t stopped thinking about you for a single moment.” 