SUBLETTE, Ill. — This was the 35th year for the Sublette Toy Show, and like always, visitors flocked to the Ellice Dinges Center for the pancake and sausage breakfast during the show.

 

Outside of the center, there were a few Sublette fire trucks, and back behind the center, visitors were able to tour an OSF medevac helicopter. Sublette, like many rural communities, depends on teams like these to make the difference when life and death emergencies arise. One of the team providing tours was Cara Adams, flight nurse for OSF Life Flight. Adams said that OSF flies from three Illinois bases located in Rockford, Peru and Peoria.

 

“We serve mostly St. Francis Hospital in Peoria and St. Anthony Hospital in Rockford. We serve an area from

northern Illinois down to Peoria.”

 

One of the benefits to having three bases to serve both the urban and rural areas is that if one helicopter is busy, Cara Adams said, “We can send another one of ours.”

 

The medevac team responds to a variety of needs. One of the largest tasks they handle, according to OSF pilot Jim Uthe, is the transfer from the outlying hospitals to the larger ones in Rockford and Peoria.

 

“We respond to a lot of incidents along the I-80 corridor, traumas with cars, motorcycles and farm accidents,” Adams added. “We also respond to and offer pediatric transfers. Our team specializes in pediatrics; we have been specially trained and certified,” Cara added.

 

If a pregnant woman is in distress, they bring NICU and labor nurses along. Adams has been part of the medevac team for five years. To be part of the medevac team requires “a minimum of 3-5 years of emergency room or EMS or ICU training,” she said. “Pre-hospital EMS training is also preferred. I had eight years’ ICU experience before coming.”

 

There is also six to nine months of aviation training to get used to working on the helicopter. On board the helicopter, there is both a pilot and co-pilot. “We always have two nurses or a nurse and paramedic,” Adams shared.

 

On board the helicopter along with a stretcher for one patient, they also have a ventilator, monitors and the needed narcotics for sedation and intubation. While the helicopter is set up for one patient, there is room for two and they may eventually change it to handle two at a time.

 

This is a specialized flying that requires the helicopter crew to be very experienced because they often land in fields and dangerous areas to get to the rural patient in need. “We have to watch for wires and telephone poles, the most challenging landings are in unimproved areas,” Jim Uthe added.

 

He has been a pilot for 13 years and serving OSF for the last eight. Being a pilot for the hospitals is the top of the line, a career goal. “This has been challenging and rewarding.”

 

“We are available for fire departments. We can take patients in quickly,” Jim said hoping that the fire districts are aware that they are available.

 

Nick Dinges knows all about responding to fire emergencies. This lieutenant in the Sublette Fire Department and paramedic is a volunteer these days, but he worked for the Rockford, Ill., fire department for 20 years prior to moving back to Sublette. Today he sells fire trucks and fire equipment out of his business in Sublette.

 

Dinges added that the very busy Sublette volunteer fire department responds to about 165 incidents a year, which he said is about one every other day.

 

“We live near the world’s largest campground, Woodhaven Lakes. There are 6,200 properties with seven miles of roads and seven lakes. Woodhaven Lakes on a busy summer weekend can have between 10,000 to 20,000 people. The campgrounds are about 25 percent of our calls. We had a bad tornado last year.”

 

For the Sublette Fire Department, calls vary between fire and medical. Fifteen of the 30 volunteers are EMS. “For a community of 450 people, June to September we probably have about one response a day.”

 

The Sublette Fire Department has been around for most a century. “We celebrated 90 years last year, this is the 91st year.”

 

The Sublette Fire Department has a lot of history, and Don Dinges, Nick Dinges’ father, is one of the founders of the Sublette Toy Show. Don Dinges announced that he will be heading up a historical fire display at this year’s Half

Century of Progress in Rantoul, Ill.