March 8, 2012 started out as a fun day of snowmobiling with friends, but quickly turned into a day I will never forget. Around 10:00 in the morning I was involved in a serious snowmobile accident where I was thrown approx. 45 feet off the trail after missing a turn. After the vicious impact, I […]
When my son was only two years old, he had to have his tonsils and adenoids removed. Although it was a simple surgery, complications arose two days later. William had a hard time breathing and his heart rate was very high. We didn’t know it at the time, but he was suffering from pneumonia. I […]
One Sunday morning last September, Bill Auger and his wife, Jo, headed out to walk their two border collies, Zipper and Snap. An active outdoorsman, Bill does a lot of hiking around his home in Oquossoc, a small town near Rangeley. He felt a little nauseous before he left, but on the walk he continued […]
In a rural, sparsely populated state like Maine, access to critical, emergency care is an ongoing challenge. Smaller community hospitals rely on knowledgeable emergency room staff and a strong EMS system to recognize seriously ill or injured patients and transport them to the closest specialty medical center. Fourteen-year-old Walker and his father, Chris, were skiing […]
Stephen Hopkins was gathering wood and boiling sap at his camp last March when he became pinned between his tractor and a tree. The sap camp is a few hundred yards from his house, down over a hill in the woods. His wife, Sharon, had just started walking back to the house when she heard […]
The first thing you notice about first grader Sophie Nelson is the sparkle in her eye, hinting at the warm spirit and infectious energy that quickly becomes obvious after spending a few minutes with her. One cold January morning in 2012, Sophie’s parents, Guy and Melissa, feared they would never see that sparkle again. Sophie […]
Sean Janko was practically raised on the slopes. He grew up going to Sugarbush in Vermont nearly every weekend with his parents and younger sister and was an accomplished freestyle skier, finishing second at state competitions. One weekend last winter, instead of heading to Vermont with his family, Sean and his friends decided to check […]
Sarah Mueller is a sophomore at the University of Maine at Farmington where she is studying to be a high school English teacher. This spirited and positive 18-year-old is not accustomed to inactivity, so last summer was difficult for her. She spent much of it in the hospital and in rehab, recovering from a nearly […]
Maine is a state of outdoors people, and our vast supply of natural resources draws like-minded people from near and far to share in our love of adventure. For some, that includes winter sports like snowmobiling and, for Sandra Bastinelli and her husband, George Orton, skiing. And this was going to be a ski trip […]
Ron Deveau was changing the fuel oil on the North Haven ferry after the last run of the day when he experienced the first signs of a heart attack. He began to feel nauseous, but thought he just needed a little fresh air. As an engineer on the ferry, Ron works for six days at […]