The Valentines Day mission had Nellie and crew flying down to Texas to pick up 24 year old Alex H.
Alex, a resident of Houston, was involved in a serious motor vehicle accident. As his mother, Mary, said by the “Grace of God” he was still alive, however, he suffered a debilitating crushed ankle and also a fractured wrist. Mary quickly made the trip to Houston to be with Alex when she learned of his accident.
In an almost unimaginable situation, the morning of February 10th, Mary received a surreal phone call that her husband of 38 years, Paul, passed away suddenly at his accounting office.
Alex had already been hospitalized for two weeks by the time GOW was contacted to provide transportation back to the family home in Kokomo, IN. Funeral arrangements for his father were pending on his and Mary’s return.
Alex wasn’t able to fly commercial back to Indianapolis because of the external fixation device that he had supporting his fractured/crushed ankle. An external fixator is a ringed cage-like device that completely encircles the leg. “Pins” are inserted into the fractured bone or bones in order to stabilize the fracture Those pins extend externally to the cages rings and are tightly fastened to the fixator to completely avoid movement of the bones to assure proper alignment during the healing process.
We left Indianapolis International on a bright and sunny Friday morning “southbound and down.” It was a pleasant, non-eventful three hour and nine minute flight to Houston’s Hobby Airport. Hal treated us to a spectacular view of Houston’s downtown during his approach into Hobby.
Upon our arrival to the Signature FBO, the ambulance was waiting on us for transport. We gathered the cot and related support equipment, loaded it into the ambulance and off we went to St Josephs Medical Center in Houston.
Other than Alex’s fractures, he was a normal healthy 24 year old guy. Definitely atypical of most of our transports. Refreshing actually!
His mother accompanied us back in the ambulance to the airport for the bittersweet trip back to Indiana. Our great supporting partners, Heartland Ambulance, sent a crew down from Kokomo to transport Alex and his mother to their home.
Funeral arrangements were finalized and Alex’s father, Paul, 63, was laid to rest on Wednesday February, 19th in his lifelong hometown of Kokomo, IN
1 Corinthians 15:56-57 “The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. (NIV)
In HIS name
Alan Taber, R.N.
