Arrington
Nelson County, VA
Story & Photos By Marcie Gates
Amongst the thousands of jam-band lovin’ land-rovers that flooded through the Oak Ridge gates, (easily doubling Nelson’s population in size), there were still quite a few locals representing Nelson County at the Lockn’ Festival last weekend.
North Branch School raised funds by promoting creativity at their tent with face painting and art projects, while Wild Wolf Brewery spread the word about their growing microbrewery.
Curtis Sheets, Chief of Wintergreen Fire and Rescue Squad, was proud to have his crew monitoring such a massive crowd at the inaugural event. And in order to operate the five strategically placed medical tents for one hundred consecutive hours, Sheets padded his team with professionals from the surrounding areas.
“We were pulling in staff from everywhere. We pulled from Amherst County, City of Lynchburg, Augusta County, City of Waynesboro, City of Staunton, Harrisonburg, and Albemarle,” says Sheets. “And from our perspective, speaking only from the medical management standpoint, it was an interesting stress test for our organization that I feel we passed very well.”
Chief Sheets was in charge of medical crews for the massive festival with over 25,000 attendees. Wintergreen F&R was granted the contract to coordinate medical services at Lockn’ Fest.
Throughout the four day music marathon, literally surrounded by miles of copious characters and personality-a-plenty, Sheets and his team managed keep their numbers low.
“We had a little over 1000 patient contacts, which includes the band-aid law – Advil, band-aids, etc, and I don’t think we ever saw anything that was life threatening. And to have that many people together at an event like that, I think that says a lot.” Chief Sheets continued.
And considering that’s coming from someone who’s packin’ a couple decades of experience under his medic belt, I’m inclined to agree with him. When caught in a jam they couldn’t dance their way out of, folks at the festival were fortunate to have this team locked in.
