By Tom Fontaine
The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
PITTSBURGH — Emergency medical service providers, many at least partly funded with public money, spent thousands of dollars combined to take part in an elaborate photo shoot at Pittsburgh International Airport involving two medical helicopters and nearly 10 percent of the region’s ambulances.
Organizers say the photo taken last week was intended to showcase the region’s variety of emergency services and equipment for National EMS Week, which ends Saturday.
Allegheny County Councilman Chuck McCullough said the photo on a taxiway shows how much traffic has fallen at the airport in recent years.
“There’s so damn little airplane traffic, I guess they have to use those runways for something,” McCullough said. “It’s come to using the airport as a backdrop for photo shoots.”
Sixty-six EMS vehicles — ambulances, special operations vehicles, two fire trucks, two helicopters and a motorcycle — assembled for the photo. The vehicles, valued at more than $15 million, based on conservative estimates from organizers and participants, came to Pittsburgh International from bases across a 10-county area in Southwestern Pennsylvania.
Airport spokeswoman JoAnn Jenny said the ground vehicles arrived at 10:30 a.m. May 10 and left by noon. She said they had to come and go quickly because an arriving U.S. marshal’s flight was scheduled to use the taxiway a short time later, as was a departing H.J. Heinz private jet.
Jenny said the authority used its staff and equipment for the shoot, which qualified as a training exercise because vehicles had to be mobilized to the airfield in an orderly manner.
Vehicles from Laurel Valley Ambulance (150 miles round-trip), Sugarcreek Township Ambulance (140 miles) and Fayette EMS (138 miles) traveled the farthest.
“I think this is a good way to show the region what we have,” said Rick Adobato, chief of the three providers. Adobato grumbled when he noticed a hubcap missing on one of his ambulances. “Apparently that happened on the way down there.”
The helicopters cost $3 million to $4 million apiece, said Dan Laurent, spokesman for West Penn Allegheny Health System, which oversees Allegheny General Hospital’s Life Flight service. Tom McElree, executive director of the Robinson-based Emergency Medical Services Institute, said an average ambulance exceeds $100,000 and special operations vehicles and fire trucks cost several times that.
Officials said the pictured vehicles weren’t scheduled to be used for emergency purposes and workers who took them to and from the photo shoot weren’t on the clock.
“We don’t take equipment out of service for photo ops,” said Bob Farrow, division chief for Pittsburgh EMS. The city sent two ambulances for the photo.
Fuel was the biggest expense, adding up to more to $2,000. The gas-guzzling ground vehicles traveled nearly 3,500 miles; a Life Flight helicopter flew from Allegheny General Hospital and a Stat MedEvac helicopter came from Allegheny County Airport. Operational costs for medical helicopters are $500 an hour and up.
Jenny said the photo will be used for a calendar and promotional materials for the agencies.
Republished with permission from The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.