By EMS1 Staff
ST. CLAIR COUNTY, Ala. — A community is mourning the death of a beloved paramedic who died Sunday from injuries she sustained in an off-duty vehicle crash.
CBS42 reported that Regional Paramedical Services paramedic Sandy Key, 48, was recovering in the hospital after being injured in a vehicle crash earlier this month when she died.
Key was a manager for the agency and had spent more than 10 years as a first responder.
Fire departments from around the area posted their condolences on social media.
“If you were in public safety in this region, you knew Sandy Key,” Pell City Fire Department member Joshua Vincent, who also worked with Key at RPS, said. “She was one of those paramedics that I would trust my kids with. She loved what she did, she loved who she worked with, she just loved helping people.”
Firefighter-EMT Blake Harbison said Key was “always the first one to volunteer,” despite working her way into management.
“It was not odd to see her on a truck running calls when she did not have to, when there were people that called out or there were shortages on the truck, she was always the first one to volunteer to stay over or come in early,” he said. “As days went by and she was gradually getting better, we were all holding out hope that she would make it and then to get that call just suddenly, it is a shock.”
Officials said the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency is still investigating the crash. Key was a passenger when the incident occurred