ShareThisSusan McGlew's big brother was always the adventurous one.
He's the one who packed his things, moved out to the Wild West, rode the rapids, skied the slopes and left the comforts of a hospital job to become a flight nurse on a medevac helicopter.
McGlew, 47, stayed back on the family farm in Massachusetts, where she still lives, in the farmhouse where her dad grew up.
But this week she mounted her own "adventure" by taking a seat in the second row of a crowded Washington, D.C., auditorium so that dozens of high-powered, federal aviation officials in business suits could see her and the picture of her sibling on her lapel.
Her brother, Bill Podmayer Jr., died in a medevac helicopter crash in Mancos, Colo., on June 30, 2005 -- just short of his 50th birthday.
Now, his little sister is using his story to help convince Congress to enact flight safety legislation so no others will die as her brother did.
"It's time to try and make a difference," she said during a break, wiping away tears. "I think Bill would say, 'Go for it.' He was never a guy to sit home."
McGlew is part of a close-knit group of helicopter-crash survivors and victims family members who are making their voices heard this week, as a special board of inquiry for the National Transportation Safety Board conducts four days of hearings on a surge in fatal accidents involving emergency medical services helicopters.
In the past six years, there have been 85 accidents involving medical helicopters, resulting in 77 fatalities. Last year was the deadliest on record, with 13 accidents and 29 deaths.
Speculation abounds about possible causes -- from pilot error, safety training and equipment issues, to questions about whether intense competition among commercial operators might be forcing pilots to fly when and where it's not safe.
Aviation officials, industry insiders and even some advocates calling for safety legislation say they can't be sure of the reasons. Hence, the board has called for four days of fact-finding testimony, and it is pushing for action on urgent safety recommendations that have been sitting on the shelf for years.
"The safety board is concerned that these types of accidents will continue if a concerted effort is not made to improve the safety of medical flights," board of inquiry chairman Robert Sumwalt told an audience of several hundred people Tuesday who are listening for answers amid the highly-technical descriptions of flight operator procedures and statistics.
From her spot in the second row, McGlew gets emotional at times. Every time the experts put a bar graph on the overhead projectors, she looks for the stats from "Bill's year," 2005, when he was one of the real people behind the 11 fatalities statistic.
Bill Podmayer grew up in Hatfield, Mass. He graduated early from high school and then blazed a trail to become the youngest man in the state to become a registered nurse.
But the West beckoned. He had a long career as a registered nurse, working in West Slope hospitals and eventually settling in Durango. There, his friend, Paul Gibson, got him "bitten by the flight bug," McGlew said.
His friend encouraged him to become a flight nurse, and in the last year of his life he did it full time.
The fateful day, June 30, 2005, began with a rescue mission. A young Boy Scout had gone missing and was feared drowned. Podmayer was part of the aerial search until they spotted the boy's body from overhead. It was too late to help.
Later that day, there was a call about a logger with a severe head injury, deep in the backcountry. The medical crew on the scene figured he was too fragile to be pulled out on bumpy roads. So they called for the helicopter.
As the helicopter approached the landing zone for the pick-up, the engines cut out, and the craft plummeted to earth. Podmayer, pilot Jim Saler, and paramedic Scott Hyslop, all died in the crash.
An investigative report blamed the crash on "a loss of engine power for undetermined reasons."
It's unclear what measures, if any, could have prevented the crash at Mancos. But through the ordeal, Podmayer's sister gained a kinship with families of other medical helicopter crash victims who have joined to push for legislation.
They want it to be mandatory that medical helicopters are fitted with high-tech equipment, like Terrain Awareness Warning Systems and night-vision goggles. They also are lobbying for improved dispatch procedures and stricter requirements for weather conditions before a flight.
"My loss is my brother," McGlew said. "I've met all these families. Their accident situations are all a little different. You all realize, you're all in this together."
Except for some work on organic farming regulations, this is the first time she and her husband, Ed McGlew, have done anything political, they said.
"We're not getting anything out of this," said Ed McGlew, 49. "There's no financial gain having this equipment put into the (helicopters)."
His wife interrupted. "The benefit we're getting is nobody going through what we've gone through,"
Through tears, she said she could use her brother's support right now as she deals with her mother's recent death and their father's current health issues. "I always thought we'd get through life as a team."
(Contact M.E. Sprengelmeyer of the Rocky Mountain News at sprengelmeyerm(at)shns.com.)
