A rescue helicopter has plucked a woman from the Murrumbidgee River after an intense search and rescue effort near the Kambah Pool on Friday.
The woman is understood to be in good health after her ordeal and was seen wrapped in a thermal blanket and being escorted in the staging area near Kambah Pool.
She had been in the river and unable to extricate herself downstream from the pool area. She is understood to have clung onto a log to keep herself above the water.
Police received the call around 10.20am, with rescue teams immediately dispatched. It is understood that the woman called for help from her mobile phone.
How the woman came to be in the river is not yet known but it is suspected she may have slipped and fallen.
The rescue effort took over three hours, with emergency services attempting to use a raft to reach her before a helicopter airlifted her out.
Water levels in the Murrumbidgee are currently rated at a "high" level, one level below "flood", after recent rainfall in the river's catchment area.
A conventional land-based rescue was assessed but there are numerous sharp rocks and steep sides to the river in that area, making it difficult to reach the victim, compounded by the fast-moving current.
Popular in summer for swimmers when the river is slow-moving, the hazards posed by Kambah Pool increase significantly as river flow rises due to more debris moving downriver and unseen underwater snags.
The body of a 75-year-old man was recovered from the Kambah Pool in January after a major police search effort.
