Thursday, June 12 at 1:05 p.m.

The idea sounded kinda fun: write a story about local and state police practicing their river rescue techniques using a helicopter and other tools.

I thought it was simply going to be a watch-and-write type of thing.

Not really.

Even though the troopers and emergency personnel made sure we weren't too close to the "landing pad," a/k/a a grassy and sandy part of the James River bank, you were still a part of the action.

Allow me to explain. As soon as the chopper's blades began a' spinning, the grass began to bend and small pieces of earth not attached to the ground such as twigs, dirt and sand, started to fly.

So, as you can imagine, as the blades got faster and faster and the copter began to rise, more particles came flying and with much more force.

Those of us who were closest were smacked first and quickly turned our backs on the helicopter. Alas, that didn't do much save for cover the backs of our necks and clothing with sand.

I was just thankful I had sunglasses on to shield my eyes and that I had closed my mouth, unlike a fellow reporter who works at a local newspaper.

Rescue after rescue, we watched from the riverbank as the helicopter would rise, circle the sky and then return to hover over those in the river. Rescuers took turns using the different tools to pull people from the water, such as landing on the rocks and pulling a person in; lowering a "cinch collar," which looks like a round life preserver; a net basket; and something called a jungle penetrator, which is a foot-long metal object that has a fold-out seat.

Most of us learned to shield ourselves, or at least turn away, every time the helicopter returned to the bank. One of the state police troopers found a great way to avoid the sand spray--he crouched behind a batch of trees.

Overall though, it was a fascinating experience to see firsthand how hard such a rescue would be as well as how NOT fun it would be to be rescued by such methods.

-- Dionne Waugh, news writer