![\"Coast](\"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/11\/Coast-Guard-pilot-William-Peterson-243x333.jpeg\")
<\/a><\/center><\/p>\nCoast Guard pilot William Peterson will be inducted onto the Wall of Gallantry at the Coast Guard Academy in New London, Connecticut for his daring rescue of eight Coast Guardsmen and contractor when their airplane crashed on a hillside on the western Aleutian Island of Attu off Alaska in 1982, according to the Sacramento Bee<\/a>.<\/p>\n Visibility was only 50 feet because of fog and winds gusted to over 46 miles per hour in the North Pacific as Peterson tried to fly a rescue helicopter to the fiery crash site. Following an emergency beacon, Peterson and his crew found three survivors who had walked down the hill and flew them to a Coast Guard base on the island.<\/p>\n Peterson returned in the helicopter and inched it up to the crash site. He and the crew found a fourth victim and flew him to safety after a gust of wind nearly blew the aircraft into the hillside as it hovered along the steep terrain.<\/p>\n Knowing it would be too dangerous to try to hover the chopper again, Peterson landed it about a mile or so down the hill. He and the crew trekked up with stretchers, returned to the helicopter with five more injured victims and then flew them to another base at a nearby island for medical treatment.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n 62-year-old Peterson retired in 2006 as the chief of aviation forces at Coast Guard headquarters in Washington, D.C.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"