Video: West Alabama Air Evac Celebrate 10 Years of Service

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FAYETTE, Ala. (WCBI) — Minutes can make a difference between life and death when waiting for emergency responders to show up to your home.

But with the help from one rural emergency response team, residents in West Alabama and East Mississippi are thankful for fast response.

In less than seven minutes, Fayette’s Air Evac team is off the ground.

“We are a rolling emergency room. We can do pretty much anything that most emergency rooms can do. We have a critical care paramedic and nurse on board and we get you to where you need to go,”  says Larry Smith.

Program Director, Larry Smith was among the first paramedics who started out at the Fayette Air Evac.

Over the last 10 years, Smith says their services have increased while budgets at local hospitals have decreased.

“Most of our average transports are 20 to 30 minutes where it usually is twice or thee times that time by ground. With rural areas closing down and ambulance services and everybody having to cut back, it makes us more valuable because we can help out when they are running short staffed,” says Smith.

Jessie Hallman, a flight nurse says the quick response matters.

“The golden hour you have an hour to get that patient to definitive care whatever they need it may be cardiac, stroke, trauma we have good local hospitals but they can only do so much,” says Jessie Hallman.

The job may be fast paced, but Hallman says it’s the daily miracles that keeps her going.

“It’s being able to go out in the community and actually see the patient and families that we’ve helped just earlier got to meet one that I helped take care of and that means a lot,” says Hallman.

Fayette Air Evac is part of the 2nd largest air ambulance in the United States.