A hiker was carried off a Hatcher Pass trail, the second rescue there this summer

An incapacitated hiker had to be carried off the Reed Lakes Trail in Hatcher Pass on Thursday, in a rescue that pulled in troopers, State Parks, Palmer Rescue and Mat-Su Borough EMS before the hiker was handed to a waiting ambulance.

The call came in mid-morning. What incapacitated the hiker, where on the trail they were found, and their condition afterward were not released.

It was at least the second rescue on the Reed Lakes route this summer. In July, a New York visitor, David Lester, fell and struck his head on the same trail and had to be flown to a hospital by a Department of Public Safety helicopter, as Alaska News reported. Vehicle access to the trailhead by way of Archangel Road opened for the season earlier this year, putting more hikers on a popular but demanding route.

The strain these rescues put on responders has drawn attention at the state level. At a May meeting of the Alaska Recreational Trails Advisory Committee, Allie Sargent, who identified herself as working in search and rescue, pressed grant applicants for data on trail call volume and response times — and asked whether proposed access improvements would "alleviate a really, really big gap in response time" for teams coming from Anchorage.