Injured teen pulled from cave in S. Arizona

TUCSON, AZ - A 16-year-old boy had to be rescued from a mountain cave in southern Arizona after he injured his leg Saturday.

Pinal County Sheriff's spokesman Elias Johnson said in an email the teen, later identified as Mason Carpenter, was found by a hiker injured inside Pepper Sauce Cave on the north side of Mount Lemmon.

Carpenter told ABC15 he was 200 yards deep in the cave when he slipped and his knee "popped."

"At first it didn't hurt but then my dad lifted my pant leg and I was like that hurts, a lot," said Carpenter.

As sheriff's deputies responded with local paramedic crews, a group of local citizens made a leg splint from nearby tree branches to support the boy's injured leg and used a plastic picnic table as a stretcher to carry him from the cave to a nearby trailhead.

"That was really hard to see him in so much pain," Mason's dad, Kelly Carpenter said.

A PCSO deputy administered first aid, but could not determine if the teen's leg was broken or dislocated. And because the teen showed signs of shock and hypothermia, a helicopter was called to the Pepper Sauce Campground to take Carpenter to the hospital.

Carpenter said he was in the cave for two hours before he was brought out.

"I want to go back but I don't think my mom will let me," Carpenter said. "I think she said I'm not going back."