Sun, May 02, 2004
Award given for volunteer flights following 9/11
LifeLine Pilots was
honored recently to accept the Public Benefit Flying Team Award
from the National Aeronautic Association and The Air Care Alliance
for volunteer-provided "Lifeguard" flight services following the
attacks of September 11, 2001.
Though virtually all flights in the US were grounded on
September 13, 2001, the FAA granted permission and a special beacon
code that allowed pilots Lyle Clapper, Norbert Ptaszek, brothers
Ward and David Montgomery, and husband and wife team Mark and Donna
Turek to transport vital skin tissue and blood platelets for the
American Red Cross and LifeSource. With virtually no lead time and
intense time constraints to keep the skin tissue viable, mission
coordinators, Mary Heath and Julie Puckett, worked through the
night to organize the multi-leg skin transport flights from St.
Paul, MN to Peoria to the Red Cross Skin Tissue Processing center
in Costa Mesa, CA. The blood platelet transport flight to
Bethesda's Military Hospital required approval from the Deputy
Mayor of Maryland and an armed guard escort to the locked down
hospital.
LifeLine Pilots executive director Keith Laken received the
award on Monday April 26 in a ceremony at the Smithsonian's
Udvar-Hazy Museum in Washington, D.C.
"Our pilots are routinely asked to fly at a moment's notice,
though nothing felt routine about the September 13th flights --
other than the extraordinary commitment of our volunteer pilots,"
Laken said upon his return from the nation's capital. "Our abiding
mission is to provide financially distressed people with free
transportation for compelling medical and humanitarian needs. The
flights of September 13th took our mission to a higher level -- the
country was in shock, yet almost instantly people rallied to find
ways to help the victims. Our pilots and our staff are honored to
have done their part."
"It was an interesting time," said Chicagoan Mark Turek, who
piloted the Bethesda-bound flight with his wife Donna. "People
needed family togetherness and our flight allowed us to have that
and help others at the same time."
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