BREAKING NEWS: Girl Injured at Falls, Rescued by Firefighters, Medics, Helicopter Crew

Siblings and strangers rushed to the aid of a teenage girl who was injured Thursday when she fell and struck her head on rocks at Big Falls in Mill Creek Canyon, and she was rescued by a contingent of firefighters, medics and a helicopter crew.

The girl, who said she came to visit the falls from Orange County, fell before 11 a.m. July 4 on a steep section of the cataract known to some long-time Forest Falls residents as Blood Rock.

She initially appeared to be unconscious, but she came to and remained awake while a young man held a shirt to her head, and others used mobile phones to call 911 for help.

Some people shed tears as they watched others helping the girl, and looked on with worry and concern.

"When I was hiking up there, all I heard was people screaming, telling her  'Don't let go,'" Zaida Rodriquez, 21, of San Bernardino, said while firefighters were still with the injured girl further up the falls.

"So I went down there and I seen the girl unconscious," Rodriguez said. "I personally thought she was dead. She wasn't moving at all. Then her brother lifted her head up and she was bleeding everywhere.

"Then this other guy slid down from the same place she came down from, trying to help her," Rodriguez said. "He even got hurt.

"And my mom was talking to the little girl, which was her sister, saying that her older sister, the one that got hurt, slipped and almost fell right there, and her younger sister grabbed her, and was trying to hold on to her.

"Her older sister was like 'Don't, just let go, just let go.'

"So the little girl felt guilty, she was crying, she was blaming herself, you know. . . . Thank god the girl who fell was conscious after a while. She didn't know what happened. We were asking her. She was like 'What happened? Where am I?' Thank god she knew her name. . . . 

"It is fun, but you need to be real careful. I mean she was at the edge of the, that's probably how she fell in the first place. She was at the edge of the little waterfall. . . . With all those rocks here, that's why I said I'm surprised she's even alive. Especially because her brother said she fell head first."

Firefighters from Station 99 in Forest Falls, Engine 34 at Mill Creek Ranger Station, and Station 98 in Angelus Oaks responded, along with medics from AMR Redlands Division.

Rescuers initially considered requesting a helicopter hoist but instead carried the girl out on a backboard-litter, using anchors and ropes to belay themselves down a steep, gravelly section of the falls trail, a crew supervisor said.

They carried her down to Mill Creek and across the wash to a waiting ambulance, which drove her to a dirt landing zone just east of Highway 38.

Firefighters and AMR personnel transferred the girl to an Upland Fire-Reach helicopter crew - pilot, chief flight nurse and medic - who flew her to Arrowhead Regional Medical Center in Colton.

An update on her condition was not available Thursday afternoon.

A weather-beaten sign at the trailhead below Big Falls warns visitors of the hazards:

"Wet rocks below the waterfalls and unstable cliffs have resulted in falls that have claimed many lives."