Tuesday, April 2: It begins late in the afternoon at "Razorback"-the call name for the Customs Caribbean Air and Marine Branch in Puerto Rico. SouthCom was on the line for Air Group Supervisor (AGS) Jose Estevez: "We have civilians from the Dominican Republic lost somewhere in the Duarte mountain range-do you have aircraft for a rescue mission?"

"What's the lat-long?" Estevez asks, shouting to his crew to stand ready. Within minutes, the Customs helicopter takes off, but by the time the Blackhawk gets to the coordinates SouthCom had cited, the mountain range is shrouded in cloud cover so dense the crew decides 12,000 feet is as low as they can go without risking a collision. Estevez and his men return to the San Isidro Air Force Base in the Dominican Republic to brief military officials there, and then continue back to Puerto Rico.

Wednesday, April 3: AGS Estevez, Customs pilot Marcelo E. Emeric, and air enforcement officers (AEO) Ramon Salgado and Ricardo Nieves take the Blackhawk up again, arriving at San Isidro for an update on the situation and the weather. An hour later, the Customs crew gets lucky-a break in the clouds allows them to move in closer to their coordinates, and they sight the stranded backpackers. One young man has a cell phone he used to call his mother the night before and to tell her to alert the authorities. This morning, the hiker's cell phone batteries are dead. The Customs crew hovering overhead has to signal the group by hand, motioning them to move down the riverbank to a spot where Emeric and Estevez think they might be able to land the chopper.

The crew flies back to San Isidro to refuel, but when they return to the mountain an hour later, the group of hikers has moved farther up the mountain, in a direction opposite the one Estevez signaled them to take. That isn't the only new complication: a platoon of Dominican Republic army mountaineers who set off the day before on foot in an attempt to rescue the hikers had not only failed to reach the group-they themselves are now stranded on the mountain range and also need to be rescued.

It's getting late, and the clouds are starting to roll in again, so the Customs crew drops a radio to the hikers and signals they'll be back in the morning. It's easy to see the group needs supplies-they're becoming weaker and having trouble walking. The entire group is beginning to suffer from dehydration-it's cold on the mountain, and the stranded hikers mistakenly believe they don't need as much water as they would in warmer conditions.

Thursday, April 4: Estevez, Emeric, and the Customs aircrew are over the Duarte mountains early. They locate the stranded hikers again, but still can't land. The closest landing site, they estimate, is 1.5 miles away, but the group radios they are too weak to walk that distance. They tell the Customs aircrew they're averaging only 10 meters-32 feet-every two hours. Estevez contacts Razorback in Puerto Rico and requests assistance-2 UH-60 Lima model helicopters deployed by a special ops unit out of Puerto Rico. The UH-60L is equipped with a hoist, and Estevez is told the helicopters are on the way, loaded with rescue equipment, and 22 personnel-medics, communication specialists, hoist operators, "the whole nine yards," says Nieves.

In the meantime, an alternate plan unfolds. The Customs aircrew transports a squad of six Dominican army rangers to a location on the mountain close to the site where the hikers and the mountaineers are trapped. The strategy is simple: the DR special forces squad will make its way to the hikers and help them down the riverbed to the landing area 1.5 miles away. The Blackhawk airdrops more supplies and returns to the military base at Constanza for refueling.

When Estevez, Emeric, and the crew return to the mountain range at 2 p.m., the DR special forces squad is right where they left them. The colonel in charge of the team radios the Customs aircrew-the rugged terrain is too much even for his elite unit. A third group is marooned in the Duartes.

Friday, April 5: At 8 a.m., the Customs Blackhawk lifts off from Constanza stagefield and returns to the airspace over the Duarte mountains where the hikers and army mountaineers wait for supplies and rescue. Customs drops the supplies and then manages to land on the mountainside where the DR special forces they dropped the day before are waiting. The six rangers are loaded onto the Customs Blackhawk and transported back to Constanza, where the U.S. Army's special forces UH-60s are also waiting with hoists and emergency personnel.

Customs briefs U.S. Special Forces personnel: the hikers are in desperate circumstances, dehydrated, and hypothermic. Weather conditions are very dangerous. The Customs Blackhawk takes off toward the Duartes for the fourth day in a row, its own crew exhausted but still determined. The UH-60s follow, and soon they are fighting the clouds for an opening, an opportunity to sweep in and finally rescue the 36 people below.

Then it happens. A window in the fog. The UH-60s swing into action, the hoists go down, and people start moving up, five at a time, carefully, until the entire group is off the ground and in the air. The UH-60s set down at the landing site 1.5 miles away, where special forces doctors check out each member of the group. They reboard quickly-Customs takes some of the hikers in the Blackhawk, while the rest remain in the UH-60s. In an hour, Customs and its Army counterparts have the group back on land in Constanza. At 5 p.m., the Customs crew departs for San Isidro Airbase.

Saturday, April 6: Estevez, Emeric, Selgado, and Nieves leave San Isidro for home-"Razorback." The Duarte Peak is empty, waiting, maybe, for the next, grueling contest between man and nature.

Officials have nothing but praise for the aircrew that refused, this time, to let nature beat them. "This operation is an example of international cooperation at its best," says Charles Stallworth, head of the Air and Marine branch at U.S. Customs Headquarters. "We are pleased that the skill and dedication of our employees combined with those of the U.S. military and the Dominican military led to such a successful outcome."