Rescue

THE ROLAND PARK Second Presbyterian Church looked absolutely stunning last Saturday for the wedding of Natalia Pia Melanie Sommer and Richard Matthew Dohler. Thousands of wildflowers, miles of lace ribbons and tulle, and window sills decorated with Singapore orchids set the stage for the nuptials of the daughter of pop music star Donna Summer and her first husband, Helmut Sommer,and the son of Dick and Bonna Dohler, he's an Ellicott City builder.The church was filled with the music of German trumpeteer Langston Fitzgerald and selections of Bach, Beethoven and Vivaldi, played by the church's music director Margaret Budd on the organ.

Dog-lovers, get out your calendars and save the date for the annual Lab Rescue Dog Walk in Annapolis.  The 2.25-mile walk raises money for the nonprofit Lab Rescue organization, which last year rescued 904 dogs. The goal this year is to raise $50,000 so the group can continue to have a big impact in helping vet and find foster and permanent homes for homeless labs.   Carol Lagundo, VP of Lab Rescue, says they are expecting more than 250 owners and more than 150 dogs at this year's walk.

Two years ago, Ocean City debuted a sunny, slightly absurd ad campaign starring a lifeguard named Rodney, who "rescued" people from their daily lives and whisked them away to the beach. With summer just around the corner, the ad series is back for another round of Rodney's rescues, which sees the lifeguard heading to downtown Baltimore and suburbia. Aired across the region, the campaign has made waves with tourists, according to town spokeswoman Donna Abbott. "It's not your standard beach advertisement," Abbott said.

Spring is a little showier around here these days, thanks to the efforts of plant specialists at the University of Maryland, College Park.  The staff at UM's Arboretum and Botanical Garden have tracked down and rescued or preserved dozens of patches of an increasingly rare wildflower known as the sundial lupine. The meadow-loving plant with tall clusters of purple flowers has been under siege from mowing, herbicides, invasive plants, deer grazing and development. As with much in nature, the wildflower's decline has affected frosted elfin butterflies, which prefer lupines for food and habitat.

Maryland Search and Rescue is holding its annual spring recruiting open house June 6 from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. at the Mt. Zion United Methodist Church, in Highland. The recruiting open house is also being held in conjunction with BSA Venture Crew 616, a coed youth program for children who are at least 13 years old and have completed the eighth grade. Maryland Search and Rescue trains and deploys volunteers to assist in lost-person searches throughout Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia and Pennsylvania.

Baltimore firefighters who staff Truck Co. 1 have received a commendation from the department for saving the life of a 2-week old baby who was suffering a heart attack in February. Because of a delayed response from an ambulance, officials said the firefighters transported the infant to the hospital in their fire truck. "The patient survived due to the quick action, and medical attention provided by members of Truck Company 1," city fire commanders said in a statement. According to the department, the firefighters responded on Feb. 7 to an East Baltimore rowhouse in the 1600 block of N. Caroline St. for a report of a baby not breathing.

Officer Americus J. Rambeau wasn't diving for a penny in the Inner Harbor on Wednesday night, but he did swim to save one. Rambeau and other officers from the city police's marine unit rescued a black Labrador mix named Penny from a pier at Harborview Marina after she left her Federal Hill home, crossed Key Highway and leaped into the cold water. "It was the right thing to do. [Penny] was struggling. Exhausted," said Rambeau, who donned a cold-water rescue suit and had to swim under two piers to capture the dog. Penny's owner, Rachel Naumann, who asked to meet the officers from the unit Thursday and hugged them, said she was at work when her roommate opened the front door to sign for a package and Penny got out. She said she spent hours searching the streets.

Not for the first time, the U.S. will have to do whatever it takes to rescue Mexico from financial crisis. Our neighbor to the south is once again convulsed by a run on the peso caused by profligate economic policies designed to ease domestic unrest. And, once again, the government is forced to respond with austerity measures punishing to a huge worker-peasant class that has seen its real earnings diminish despite increasing industrialization.But that is not Mexico's only problem. As a medium-sized Third World nation that shares a 2,000-mile border with the world's richest, biggest, market, its position is truly unique.

A group that salvages Holocaust-era Torahs from Europe and sells them to congregations in the United States has agreed to stop promoting dramatic rescue stories unless it can document them, according to an agreement with Maryland authorities sparked by complaints about the group's practices. An investigation into the operations of Save a Torah of Rockville followed a Washington Post Magazine article that raised questions about stories told by Rabbi Menachem Youlus, the group's leader.

In the second row house fire in Baltimore in two days, an elderly woman and her daughter were hospitalized after their two-story Hampden home went up in flames Monday morning. A man who rescued one of the women was slightly injured. A spokesman for the Baltimore Fire Department said the fire occurred at about 9 a.m. in the 3300 block of Elm Avenue. A man from the area, who remained unidentified, forced a door open and was able to bring one of the two women out of the brick structure, said the spokesman, Chief Kevin Cartwright.

Among the 63 calls the Arbutus Volunteer Fire Department received for medical and fire-rescue service during the period April 22-29 were the following: Illinois Avenue, 3000 block, 11:50 p.m. April 28. Crews from the English Consul, Arbutus, Lansdowne and Violetville volunteer stations and Halethorpe career station responded to the report of a dwelling fire in Baltimore Highlands and extinguished a small stove top fire. Furnace Avenue, 5600 block, 7:56 p.m. April 27. Crews responded to the report of a dwelling fire in Elkridge and assisted local units in extinguishing the fire.

When a deadly earthquake struck Haiti in 2010, and Hurricane Katrina hit Louisiana seven years ago, humans weren't the only creatures in distress. Countless horses and other animals also needed help, and emergency teams from the Woodbine-based Days End Farm Horse Rescue came to their aid. The 58-acre farm in Woodbine, established in 1989, has carved out an international reputation for its work training first responders, animal control officers,...

In February, Spike TV announced "Bar Rescue," a design makeover show, would take up the cause of J.A. Murphy's in Fells Point. The show was coming at the request of owners Keith Murphy and Joel Gallant. Theirs was one of more than 200 bars to apply for a guest spot on the show, the network said. Two months later, a new J.A. Murphy's, now dubbed a cliched Murphy's Law, quietly reopened. You could be forgiven for not knowing about it. While the bar got a new draft system and upgraded look, it seems the show's producers - or the owners - forgot to fix some things.

Federal authorities said they have rescued a 15-year-old girl from being prostituted by a Washington man who had advertised her on the Backpage website and took her to College Park to meet a man. Melvin Longwood, age 31, was indicted on charges of transporting a minor for the purposes of prostitution. Authorities, working with the National center for Missing and Exploited Children, allege he used the girl between September and February. The investigation began with a report of a missing teenager from Virginia.

Three boaters were rescued Monday evening from Middle River by Natural Resources Police after their small boat capsized in choppy, wind-swept water, the agency reported. An officer found Dwayne W. Abbott, 28, of Essex and Jonathan M. Miller, 11, and William H. Miller, 34, both of Middle River in the 58-degree water near Wilson Point with help from the Baltimore County aviation unit. The boaters were transferred to a Baltimore County Fire Department boat and then taken to Franklin Square Hospital for evaluation, the police report said.

Stacey Heaver, of Westminster, a member of Gettysburg College's Gettysburg Recreational Adventure Board (GRAB), recently used her wilderness training and expertise as the unit was called upon to help rescue a woman who fell 80 feet off a cliff at the Red River Gorge in Kentucky. Heaver and other GRAB students had spent their spring break at the gorge, participating in a climbing program and learning about high line rescues. Just days before they were slated to leave, one of the search and rescue volunteers who had worked with them earlier in the week contacted the group to ask for help — a woman had fallen near an area called Indian Staircase.

Stacey Heaver, of Westminster, a member of Gettysburg College's Gettysburg Recreational Adventure Board (GRAB), recently used her wilderness training and expertise as the unit was called upon to help rescue a woman who fell 80 feet off a cliff at the Red River Gorge in Kentucky. Heaver and other GRAB students had spent their spring break at the gorge, participating in a climbing program and learning about high line rescues. Just days before they were slated to leave, one of the search and rescue volunteers who had worked with them earlier in the week contacted the group to ask for help — a woman had fallen near an area called Indian Staircase.

Several columns ago, I wrote about the 160th anniversary of the foundering of the HMS Birkenhead off the West African coast that established the maritime tradition of "women and children first" when it comes time to evacuate a stricken vessel. My good friend, Helen Delich Bentley, the former congresswoman and former federal maritime commissioner, wrote in a letter to the editor of The Baltimore Sun that I had overlooked one of the most dramatic Atlantic sea rescues of all time, when the Missouri, out of Baltimore, rescued all passengers and crew from the steamer Danmark in 1889.

Barbara Lee Goldberg, a retired attorney who was a donor to animal rescue causes, died of a stroke Feb. 27 at the Greater Baltimore Medical Center. The Phoenix resident was 78. Born in Baltimore and raised in Cockeysville, she was a 1951 Towson Catholic High School graduate. She earned a bachelor's degree at Towson University and received a law degree from the University of Baltimore. She later returned to school and received two additional master's degrees and a bachelor's degree from what is now Notre Dame of Maryland University.