On Veterans Day, one can wear a poppy to symbolize sacrifice for national freedoms, thank a veteran for his/her service, or simply take the holiday to celebrate personal choice. Another possibility is to remember a Veteran, like Bountiful resident Terry Mercer, who not only served his country but continued his heroic service in Utah. Mercer was drafted at age 19 to serve in Vietnam. “I got shot,” said Mercer. “I got my purple heart and came home.” 

Mercer said the last six months of recovery in Fort Bragg, North Caroline included many parties down at Myrtle Beach which was just so much fun. Later after graduating from Utah State University and marrying his lifetime sweetheart Brooke, he met a couple navy recruiters in the Union Building and decided to go forward with flight training through the Navy. He worked on the carriers down in Florida for several years and then suggested to his detailer that he would like to finish out his service in Japan. 

He rounded out his family in Japan with his last two kids and the adoption of a Japanese baby called, Imari. He talked to someone about his desire to adopt and three weeks later, he got a call, “OK, there’s been a little girl born, do you want him?” Everyone kept referring to his potential daughter as a “him,” so when Mercer arranged a training flight down to Hiroshima and went to the hospital and a nurse brought out the six-day old baby, he checked her diaper to make sure it really was a little girl to ally with their own little girl across from four brothers and said “I’ll take him.”

After his service was complete, he found work in the Utah Highway Patrol for a few years and settled in Davis County. After the death of a helicopter pilot working for UHP, he was asked to apply for the position and started working in Search and Rescue for all the counties in Utah. On one of these rescue missions he was asked to go look for a hiker named Aron Ralston who was overdue. His truck had been found and Mercer started flying the nearby canyons. Ralston had just decided to cut off his arm since it had been pinned for a few days and he thought it was either that or die in place. Mercer saw the injured hiker and the couple he had met up with as he attempted to hike out. The small group signaled to the helicopter that they were in need of help. It was challenging landing the helicopter without clipping the nearby rock walls. Aron was concerned about bleeding in his helicopter, but Mercer encouraged him to hop in and flew him to the hospital in Moab, likely saving his life. Mercer later went back for the hand at the doctor’s request but it was firmly stuck under a huge boulder and he and his friend were unable to remove it. Later a team from Jackson went in and jacked up the rock, recovering the hand. They burned it and gave the ashes back to Ralston. Removing the partial arm and hand seemed important to keep people from trying to hike to see it. 

Later, Mercer was asked to be in the movie with his helicopter to keep it as close to the truth as possible. He played his part in “127 Hours” and still receives a check for this work. Later he “landed on a pinnacle down in St. George” to rescue another hiker. He was on the front page of the Deseret News for this rescue and was even flown to New York to be on the Today Show. Mercer acknowledged that there is a lot of risk to his job. He noted that sometimes due to weather, he would have to land wherever was available and wait out the storm. Ice collecting on rotors can make it difficult to keep altitude. Visibility can also be a problem. He knows a lot of former military pilots that didn’t survive. “Sometimes you gotta stop and wait,” said Mercer, “and sometimes you gotta push it on.”