Ralph Hylton paused at a traffic light on the Eastern Shore. Thirty miles away, the crew of a Maryland State Police MedEvac helicopter cleaned up after dinner in a drab office in a hangar at Martin State Airport in Middle River.
It was 8:20 p.m., Sunday, Aug. 27, an unspectacular day closing one of summer's final weekends. Then suddenly, Mr. Hylton was slammed against the driver's door of his small pickup truck and whipped across into the caved-in passenger side. Within minutes, a call went out for one of the state's 11 MedEvac helicopters, sending Trooper One to the rescue.
MedEvac helicopters have been saving lives in Maryland for 25 years -- longer than any other public-service airborne-ambulance program in the country. Now based at eight sites, the rescue service has flown more than 64,000 patients to the Maryland Shock Trauma Center in Baltimore and other hospitals around the state with a survival rate greater than 90 percent.
A Sun reporter and photographer rode with Trooper One for the 3 p.m.-11 p.m. shift Aug. 24 through Aug. 27, during which the helicopter airlifted eight patients. The severity of their injuries varied, but each flight of Trooper One proved to be another race against the helicopter's relentless and formidable foe -- time.
And if ever time was critical in saving a life, it was for Ralph Hylton.
State police in Kent County said Mr. Hylton -- a 50-year-old heating, ventilation and air-conditioning mechanic driving home to take his wife to dinner -- pulled his small pickup truck into the path of a full-size pickup truck at U.S. 301 and Route 313.
The larger truck smashed into his truck's passenger side and drove it head-on into a guardrail.
The first paramedic to reach Mr. Hylton called for a helicopter as soon as she found him choking on his own blood in his crumpled front seat. She detected only a faint pulse.
Trooper One gave Mr. Hylton his only chance for survival.
Despite nearly dying from multiple injuries upon his arrival at Shock Trauma, he has survived there for two weeks -- where he remained yesterday in critical but stable condition.
"If it wasn't for the helicopter and if it wasn't for Shock Trauma, Ralph would be dead by now," said Mr. Hylton's wife, Joan, who with family members drives two hours every day from the Massey in Kent County to sit by his bedside. "The doctors say he still has a rocky road ahead of him. But he's hanging in there. I just know he's going to make it."
