ARVIAT
This past April, Joe Karetak was surprised when he received a call from the Governor General's office informing him he would receive the Medal of Bravery in Ottawa May 1.

Joe Karetak of Arviat, right, used his harpoon to pull pilot Yvan Lavertu, left, from his helicopter after it broke through the ice during an attempted rescue. - photo courtesy of Susanne Karetak Joe Karetak, centre, with Governor General David Johnston and Karetak's daughter Kayley Allin, after receiving the Medal of Bravery at an Ottawa ceremony May 1. - photo courtesy of Susanne Karetak

One year after saving his rescuer from a sinking helicopter on the sea ice about 10 km east of Arviat, the RCMP called Joe Karetak in for an interview.

After Karetak once again repeated the details of the January 2013 incident that ultimately saw him, his son Joe Jr., 20, and pilot Yvan Lavertu lifted off the ice to safety, the officer informed him someone had submitted his name for the honour.

"If it's all the same to you, I wouldn't even bother following it up," Joe remembers telling the officer. "I wasn't that interested. So I thought it was over."

In retrospect, he says, "I think, mainly, I was just trying to forget about the whole thing. It was a bit of a tough ordeal. I wanted to really move on and just was always glad we made it and everything worked out."

However, Karetak tells his harrowing story - at moments, with gentle laughter - mainly so others can increase their own chances of survival He recalls that from the moment he knew he and his son were in trouble he was worried about the searchers. The temperature was -60 C and steam was rising from the sea.

"I knew if they were going to try to look for us, they were going to put themselves in danger. I always had this intuition of things not turning out well."

He did not anticipate the chopper. He thought it might be people coming by boat.

"It's not doable. Everything is going to freeze. And there's too much steam. You can't even see five, 10 feet ahead of you from the steam."

Karetak had one thing on his mind - getting his son to the main ice. This was for two reasons - to keep searchers safe and to save Joe Jr.'s life.

"I had gotten wet right away when we first drifted off, so I didn't think I was going to make it. My strategy was to get us as close as possible to the main ice so at least my son could make it. Because I was wet and if you're wet and in 50-plus below weather .... You know you're not going to last.

"I had already accepted that I wasn't."

The experience reinforced how he saw life and how he understands it to be, he said.

He struggled through the afternoon and night, wet and frozen, but by morning he was really suffering.

"I could only walk about 30 feet at a time. I was so exhausted and my body was just ... being cold for so long my energy would sap after 30 to 50 feet. Then I had to stop to rest.

"At that time I thought, whatever issues or anything that's happened that's really ... it's just dead weight. Especially if it's not productive. Why would I want to drag something that's really just dead weight? If you can appreciate something (from an experience like that) I appreciate it for seeing that way.

"In some strange ways - and it could be that your mind starts to go from that continuous beating you get from the environment - I was actually starting to feel quite content. I wasn't sad. I was actually quite at peace at this point."

Karetak laughs, saying "that was prior to the accident, right?"

He still had at least one more earthly feat to accomplish - helicopter pilot Yvan Lavertu's life would need saving and that moment was coming up.

Karetak and his son were found by heat sensor and soon Lavertu's helicopter hovered near, just above the three to four inches of fresh ice, a couple of miles yet from the main ice. Signals crossed in the glaring morning sun.

"I had my back to the sun and the sun was reflecting on the windshield and I couldn't see the pilot. I guess he had been gesturing to see if he could land there or not. I didn't respond, obviously, and he thought it was OK."

Karetak thought the pilot would continue to hover and turned his back to gather up a sleeping bag and a few other items.

"As soon as I turned around I heard his engine slow down. As soon as he did that, he was now on the ice. It gave away right away. One side went down. That tilted the chopper and even though he tried to power up, the blade hit the ice. Instant silence.

"Except you could hear the blade flying away in the air for a long ways - the broken piece."

One ski and the tail snagged, slowing the sinking process, allowing Lavertu time to kick the door open and free himself. By then he was about 10 feet away from Karetak, who'd prepared himself by having his son bring him the harpoon. While Karetak watched the pilot struggle - with one hand he clung to the harpoon and with the other he frantically fought to release himself from his headset still connected to the sinking helicopter - Karetak's mind was already on next the steps. Basic survival training - you kick into auto-pilot.

"When you're going through that situation, you just think about what you've got to do. It's a trained response. You just react.

"The thing I'm trying to remember as I see him swimming towards me is what do you do with a person who is going to experience hypothermia right now in this worst condition. One thing you have to do is prevent them from going into shock."

Karetak wrapped up the pilot in the sleeping bag, blocked the wind with the parachute that had dropped the sleeping bag and continuously talked to him. The three were airlifted out about 30 minutes later by another helicopter.

Lavertu called Karetak on Christmas Day to see how he was doing. Lavertu himself is doing well. He had to pass tests to get his pilot's licence back - a necessity after such an accident.

Joe Jr. is also moving forward with his life.

"For anybody it would have been a very difficult experience to go through. And being the first time in his life that he would have encountered something like that, it would have a mental impact. It definitely could cause one to go through depressions. It takes quite a bit of time to overcome stuff like this."

For Karetak, moving forward involves accepting that his body has aged sooner

rather than later

"All my frozen parts healed up, it was very uplifting. But it's the hardest thing I've ever had to experience on my body. At my age it was very noticeable that it wasn't recovering for a while. The body doesn't appreciate being put through that."

He says every time he felt a bit of cold, his body would just try to give in.

"It wouldn't even try to fight the cold. Whatever we had preserved to help us go through something like that ... I think once you deplete that, it doesn't really recoup."

He can't hunt anymore, but his sons are very capable hunters.

"It's not like I have to go. I just manage how we're going to operate throughout the year and ... that's what I do now. Make sure everything's good to go - that's it."

He adds, "If I didn't understand patience, I might have to learn to understand that now."

Karetak is grateful to the people who rescued he and his son, and grateful to the people in Ottawa who managed the Medal of Bravery ceremony.

"Real people's people," he says.

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