LEONARDTOWN, Md. — MedStar Health’s inaugural transport food drive at Leonardtown High School collected more than 1,000 pounds of food Saturday, drawing community attention with the landing of a MedSTAR medical helicopter and mobilizing transport teams to support local food insecurity efforts.
Organizers reported 1,074 pounds of non-perishable food donations, enough to fill both a ground ambulance and a transport van, which were later delivered to St. Mary’s Caring at the Knott Family Center.
The donations will primarily support Feed St. Mary’s Caring Food Pantry, with a portion directed to MedStar St. Mary’s Hospital’s internal pantry, which helps patients and families with specialized dietary needs.
An Inaugural Community Initiative
Deborah Schindler, senior director of media and public relations for MedStar Health, said the event marked the first time MedStar’s transport teams organized a food drive in St. Mary’s County.
“We are here for our inaugural transport food drive,” Schindler said. “We’re trying to bring in as much as we can to collect non-perishable food donations for Feed St. Mary’s food pantry.”
Schindler said MedStar leaders were encouraged by early participation and are considering making the initiative an annual event.
“This is the first time we’re doing this, and we’re liking it so much that they’re thinking maybe we’ll do this next year,” Schindler said.
Supporting Local Needs
While most donations will support Feed St. Mary’s, Schindler said MedStar St. Mary’s Hospital also maintains a smaller pantry designed to support patients and families.
“At MedStar St. Mary’s Hospital, we have a very small pantry that has more specific dietary needs for patients or families,” she said. “Some of this will go there, but most is going to Feed St. Mary’s.”
Helicopter Landing Highlights Emergency Transport
To draw awareness to the event, MedSTAR flew a medical helicopter into the Leonardtown High School parking lot into the Leonardtown High School parking lot, where residents were invited to drop off donations and meet transport personnel.
Andrew Glory, a MedSTAR Transport pilot with Metro Aviation, said the helicopter landing at Leonardtown High School served both as a community outreach opportunity and a way to highlight the role of air medical transport in Southern Maryland.
Glory explained that Metro Aviation supplies pilots and mechanics for MedSTAR operations and that he has been flying with the MedSTAR program for about two and a half years but has approximately 15 years of overall flying experience. He said participating in the event and using the helicopter to raise awareness for food insecurity in St. Mary’s County was meaningful for the team.
“I’ve been with MedSTAR about two and a half years now and with Metro Aviation, who actually operates for MedStar, for about five years,” Glory said. “We have three bases, great crews, great pilots and it’s been really great. We have a great team here and I’m excited to be doing more PR events like this.”
Before joining MedSTAR, Glory served in the military, beginning as a helicopter mechanic in the United States Marine Corps, then transferring to the Army National Guard, where he worked as a Black Hawk mechanic before attending flight school at Fort Rucker, Alabama, and becoming a Black Hawk pilot.
Glory recently moved into a leadership role as aviation site manager, allowing him to work more closely with MedSTAR management and support operational coordination. He said MedSTAR operates a high-tempo air medical program, which has one base stationed at St. Mary’s County Regional Airport, and that he can see two or three service flights a day with a standard crew being one pilot, one nurse and one medic.
“I’d say we average two to three flights a day per base, so we stay pretty busy with the MedStar program,” Glory said. “Every flight is different, depending on the weather, the crew, the patient — you’ve just got to be dynamic.”
Glory also emphasized the educational value of events like the Leonardtown High School food drive, encouraging students interested in aviation or emergency medicine to explore pathways through military service, volunteering with fire departments, or early aviation programs.
“If you’re interested in being on a flight crew someday, starting with fire departments and volunteering is a good transition and helps you work your way up,” Glory said. “Programs like aviation clubs and Civil Air Patrol are great — I wish I had something like that when I was in high school.”
Why Medevac Matters In Rural St. Mary’s County
St. Mary’s County resident Scott McKee said working as a flight paramedic with MedSTAR Transport is demanding, fast-paced and highly rewarding, especially in a rural area like St. Mary’s County where air medical transport can make the difference between life and death.
“It’s busy, it’s very challenging, but rewarding — and being able to adapt and overcome is the name of the game,” McKee said.
McKee said he began flying medevac missions in 2008 in deep South Texas near the U.S.-Mexico border and joined MedStar Medevac in 2013 after connecting with a pilot who had transferred into the program. He now works in Southern Maryland aboard MedStar Three, based at St. Mary’s Regional Airport.
“This is extremely important, being in a rural area, there just aren’t certain services available, like cardiac interventional services,” McKee said. “So having a medevac that can transport patients to those facilities is changing lives.”
McKee described the job as one that requires constant adaptation, particularly when responding to emergencies with limited time, limited space and only a small crew. McKee said MedStar’s presence at St. Mary’s County Regional Airport is especially important in a rural area, where transport to specialized care in Washington or Baltimore can take hours by ground. In those cases, he said, “without this service, patients would die.”
McKee also said MedStar’s collaboration with the Maryland State Police Aviation Division helps strengthen emergency response in the region through mutual aid when one service is unavailable or already committed.
On the food drive itself, McKee said events like the one at Leonardtown High School reflected the importance of collaboration between MedStar transport teams, MedStar St. Mary’s Hospital and the broader community. He said providing a way for residents to donate food to families in need is rewarding and highlights a broader mission of service beyond emergency response.
“Considering the challenging times that we’re in right now, the collaboration between our department, MedStar transport, and St. Mary’s Hospital has been paramount,” McKee said. “Providing an opportunity for people to donate food to families that are in need is rewarding in itself.”
Kristen Emelio, a flight nurse who typically operates out of Indian Head, described her role as both dynamic and deeply meaningful, emphasizing the importance of medevac services in rural areas like Southern Maryland.
“If we can’t fly you, you might be going two or three hours by ground. That’s a huge difference for some people,” Emelio said.
Emelio, who has worked as a flight nurse for two years after spending roughly a decade in hospital settings, said the transition to air medical transport allows her to meet patients where they are and deliver critical care when time is most limited.
“It’s one of those jobs where you feel like, how did I even get into this? It’s just so cool,” Emielio said. “I worked in the hospital for about 10 years, and being able to come outside of the hospital and meet patients where they’re at is awesome. Every day is different.”
Emelio said many residents may not realize how vital air transport is in rural communities, where specialized care for strokes, heart attacks and trauma may be hours away by ground ambulance.
“I think people don’t even realize how important it is. People assume any hospital can handle a stroke or heart attack, and that’s just not always the case,” Emelio said. “Being able to get someone quickly to a hospital with those services — the time makes a huge difference.”
Emelio also highlighted the unpredictable nature of the job, noting that some shifts may involve a single flight while others can include multiple emergency responses over a 12-hour period.
She noted that, “the most memorable moments are when I hear how someone did afterwards,” Emelio said. “When you find out they did well, it reminds you why you’re in this job.”
From Community Health To Advanced Care
Lori Werrell, assistant vice president of Care Transformation at Medstar, said the MedSTAR Transport Food Drive at Leonardtown High School served two key purposes: raising awareness of emergency transport capabilities in St. Mary’s County and addressing food insecurity through community partnerships.
“What we’re doing here today is a couple things. One, we are making sure our community knows that MedSTAR Transport is here and available, and how quickly and efficiently we can get someone to a tertiary care facility,” Werrell said.
Werrell explained that MedStar works closely with Feed St. Mary’s and St. Mary’s Caring to address food insecurity, including maintaining an internal hospital pantry for patients experiencing food insecurity following treatment. She said the initiative helps ensure patients can recover safely at home, rather than returning to the hospital due to lack of access to food or other social needs.
“We don’t want food to be the reason that they’re coming back to the hospital or not able to get better,” Werrell said. “We are in partnership with several of the food distribution sites in the county, including St. Mary’s Caring and Feed St. Mary’s.”
Werrell also emphasized the importance of MedStar Transport services in a rural county like St. Mary’s, where rapid transport to specialized care facilities in Washington can significantly improve outcomes for stroke, cardiac and other critical patients.
“If you need a heart catheterization, we can have you in a cath lab within an hour,” Werrell said. “That kind of care allows folks to have confidence in their community hospital.”
Werrell said the MedStar helicopter based at St. Mary’s County Regional Airport plays an important role in strengthening confidence in the local hospital by ensuring patients can quickly access advanced care when needed.
“We have one in our county at all times, which enables us to get it in the air very quickly,” Werrell said.
The person who spearheaded MedSTAR Transport’s food drive plan at Leonardtown High School is also responsible for paramedic logistics in southern Maryland. Ron Armontrout, operations manager for MedSTAR Transport, said their presence in St. Mary’s County plays a critical role in connecting rural tri-county patients to specialized care facilities across the region, often reducing transport times from several hours by ground to less than 30 minutes by air.
“Tertiary care is so far away from down here. If you’re doing that trip by ground, it’s an hour and a half or two hours — or even three depending on traffic,” Armontrout said. “With the helicopter being down here, that’s a 25-minute flight — no traffic, just a smooth ride up there.”
Armontrout said the organization operates three helicopters across Maryland, including one based at St. Mary’s County Regional Airport, along with ground-based critical care transport units positioned elsewhere in the region. He explained that MedSTAR’s primary mission in St. Mary’s County involved hospital-to-hospital critical care transport.
“To get to Franklin Square in Baltimore could be three hours by ground, where the helicopter can do it in about 30 to 35 minutes,” Armontrout said.
Armontrout also emphasized coordination between MedSTAR Transport, local EMS agencies and the Maryland State Police Aviation Division, noting that MedSTAR has recently assisted with scene responses in St. Mary’s County when additional resources were needed.
“We are always here and available to help out however we can,” Armontrout said.
In addition to operational responsibilities, Armontrout said the Leonardtown High School food drive grew from an idea he first proposed as a way to address food insecurity while raising awareness of MedSTAR’s services. He said bringing a helicopter and ambulance to the event was intended to draw attention and encourage community participation.
“Food insecurity is a huge issue, and we wanted to do what we can to help combat that,” Armontrout said. “What better way to help out than to bring in a huge MedSTAR helicopter to get attention and encourage people to donate.”
Armontrout also highlighted the workforce development opportunity presented by the event, noting that students from the nearby Forrest Career and Technology Center were able to speak directly with flight crew members and learn about career pathways into critical care transport.
“This is a very niche role in healthcare, and events like this give students the opportunity to talk with people doing the job and understand the career path,” Armontrout said. “For nurses and paramedics, you need at least three years and 4,000 hours of critical care experience to do this work.”
Armontrout said events like the Leonardtown High School food drive also help introduce students to career paths in emergency and critical care transport — an opportunity local educators say is critical for building the next generation of healthcare professionals.
From High School Classrooms To Healthcare Careers
Bonnie Skinner said the MedStar food drive gave local students a chance to serve the community while also seeing firsthand what healthcare careers can look like in St. Mary’s County.
Skinner, who teaches in the Academy of Health Professions at the Dr. James A. Forrest Career and Technology Center and works as a registered nurse at MedStar St. Mary’s Hospital, attended the event with six students from across the county’s three public high schools.
Skinner said the Tech Center’s health professions program prepares students for healthcare careers through classroom instruction, clinical placements and workforce partnerships. Students study anatomy, physiology and other foundational health sciences, then complete clinical experiences at MedStar St. Mary’s Hospital, St. Mary’s Nursing Center and local physician offices.
“Our program is a three-year program, so they do anatomy and physiology and all the basics to become a health professional,” Skinner said. “They do clinicals at MedStar St. Mary’s and the local nursing center, and some of the local physicians’ offices.”
Skinner said the program also includes apprenticeship and internship opportunities, allowing some students to begin working in healthcare before graduating. She noted that many students complete the program with certification as nursing assistants, while others continue into more advanced careers.
“MedStar St. Mary’s does an internship, so they work as interns the summer of their junior-senior year, then they just have a job when they graduate,” Skinner said. “I am incredibly lucky to be able to work at the Tech Center with these students, because they all want to be here, and they all work hard to advance their education.”
Community events like the food drive allowed Skinner’s students to volunteer, connect with healthcare professionals and better understand specialized roles such as flight paramedics, nurses and emergency transport personnel.
“My students are volunteering to help collect the food and load it in the ambulance when it’s over,” Skinner said. “It was a great opportunity for them.”
Skinner also emphasized the importance of developing a stronger local healthcare workforce in St. Mary’s County, saying entry-level opportunities can help students build toward careers as nurses, physician assistants and doctors who may eventually return to serve the community.
“A lot of my students went to volunteer with the rescue squads and take their EMT courses and became EMTs, and now many of them are paramedics,” Skinner said. “One of the paramedics that was from my class went on to become a physician’s assistant who works in the ER now.”
Looking Ahead
Schindler said MedStar leaders are already considering expanding the food drive concept beyond St. Mary’s County. She also called this their inaugural event and said it would be great to do this every year.
Following the event, volunteers loaded the donations into a ground ambulance and transport vehicle before delivering them to St. Mary’s Caring at the Knott Family Center, where MedStar recently opened a community health office. The food will now be distributed to families across St. Mary’s County, extending the day’s impact beyond the helicopter landing and into the community.
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