- Will you consider this, it flies on the radar but is under the radar, how can that be?

I'm Christine Zak-Edmonds, stay with me.

(upbeat music) For 40 years, it's been a service headquartered in Peoria, Illinois, but not many people are aware of Lifeline Pilots, and what this volunteer service is all about.

Executive Director, Lindsey Kerr fills us in on all of the details.

This is Lifeline Pilots, different than life flight.

- That's right, we do non-emergency medical flights for people in need.

So we're not a life flight where we're flying people with helicopters.

We have private pilots who are flying people to medical care far from home.

- Now let's see, there are, this has been around since 1981, why don't a whole lot of people know about this, or how do they find out about it?

- Sure, we are a small organization, we're based here in Peoria, but we only have three staff members, but we cover 10 states in the Midwest.

That's 70 million people in our territory, - [Christine] Wow!

- and we have a really small budget, we operate on a shoestring, so it's really hard to get the outreach out there.

So doing interviews like this, it's a fantastic way for us to be able to share our message, especially with those locally.

We're a local organization, we're based here in Peoria, we do a lot of flights in Peoria.

In the last six months, we've done almost 20 flights for people who needed to travel for medical care far from home locally, but that's only a drop in the bucket for what we're doing throughout our region.

- So what states are in the region, they're mostly Wisconsin, Illinois, and then a little bit East, a little bit South.

- Sure, so we kind of go from Iowa to Ohio and then from Tennessee North to the Canadian border, that kind of gives you an idea of where we're located.

- And then the pilots, you have some 450, maybe more pilots and they have own planes.

- Yeah, every pilot either owns their own plane, they might belong to a flight club where they share in ownership of a plane.

Some of our pilots even rent a plane in order to fly with us.

And our pilots are located throughout our 10 state region.

So if somebody contacts us from Ohio and they need to fly to Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, we have pilots in Ohio who would fly them.

So a lot of our pilots and our passengers, we never get to meet.

- Well, okay, so then they originate in your region, - [Lindsey] Yes.

- and then they can be flown just about anywhere that they need to go or is there a limit to that?

- So we have a limit of about a thousand miles, and that's because our pilots are flying small planes.

So when somebody contacts us and they need to go on a flight, they complete our application online, and we get a physician's release from their doctor.

As soon as that happens, then we go to work finding pilots.

We have a great database that we send the request out to our pilots, and once a pilot accepts that flight then we put it all together.

But a lot of people who fly a small plane, they can only go about 300 miles at a time, so we kind of work like a relay race, so if someone needs to go, let's say 900 miles, pilot number one would pick them up, meet pilot number two at a predetermined destination, then they would fly, meet pilot number three who would take them all the way.

So it's a lot to coordinate.

My staff are very talented.

- You said there's only three of you?

- There's only three of us.

- Oh boy, that's a lot of being the air traffic controller really.

- Yeah, that's right, they have a lot of knowledge about our region, about airports, about weather conditions.

We've just gone through a snowstorm here in Illinois and it doesn't matter, they're able to just deal with all of it.

- How do the pilots get involved?

You said some of them belong to flight clubs, but then they've just heard about this service, because they have their own little, they're hanging out at the hangers, right?

- That's right, so there's a variety of ways that pilots find out about us.

The biggest one is word of mouth.

It's the same with passengers, the biggest way that they hear about it is other people sharing.

A pilot might be involved and they tell the other pilots in their hangar that, who share that same hangar with them, hey, I fly for this great organization, you should consider flying too.

We have some requirements, they have to be 21 years old, they have to have 250 hours as pilot and commander of an aircraft.

And that's just to make sure that everyone who's flying, they're doing it in the safest way.

We've been flying for 40 years and we have a hundred percent safety record.

So we're sure to maintain that, our pilots are the ones that make the call.

And I don't know if you know very many pilots, but they are the most safety conscious people I've ever met.

- Well, when there is weather coming, it's like, okay, we go now or we don't go, isn't that it?

- That's exactly it.

So when our passengers contact us, we always tell them that they need to have a backup plan, because pilots are flying small planes, and when you have bad weather, it might be nice on the ground but it might be icing conditions up in the sky.

And so a pilot flying a four seater aircraft might not have the capability to deal with that weather, with that cold weather.

And so we might have to delay the flight, so a backup plan for our passengers might be that they have another way to get there, they purchase a commercial ticket, maybe they drive, they have somebody who helps them, or it might just be that they reschedule their appointment and we fly in another day.

- How long does it take you to put together one of the missions?

- Sure, so it really just kind of depends on several factors.

For a new passenger, we need at least four or five working days in order to get the flight, and the big hold up is that we get a physician's release.

So that physician's release is us contacting the doctor, having them complete our form saying, one, that the passenger does need to travel for medical care.

So that kind of confirms the need for us.

- [Christine] Right.

- And two, it says that they're in good enough health to go on a small plane.

- Okay, so it's not necessarily, well, you have to make sure that all of those factors are good, but it's not the doctors referring people to you, it is the passengers or their loved ones in need?

- So it can be either.

Sometimes it's the passengers, sometimes it's a family member, but we also get a lot of referrals from doctors, nurses, a lot from social workers.

Social workers are probably the ones that do it the most from the medical field, because they're the ones that are sitting with the patient, and really understanding what their needs are in order to get them to that appointment.

We say that we're providing equal access to healthcare through transportation.

And it's those social workers who see that, this person is gonna go without this healthcare, if they don't receive some sort of help getting there.

- And what types of situations, what types of patients are there that need these services elsewhere, or, I mean, it's just about anything?

- It's across the spectrum, I mean, we deal with a lot of people who are coping with cancer diagnosis.

That's probably the majority if, when we're looking at who we're helping, the majority of people are dealing with some form of cancer.

Otherwise, sometimes people are going for second opinions, sometimes people need to see specialists that aren't available in their local area.

We fly a lot of children out to Boston Children's Hospital, because there is a doctor out there that deals with congenital heart defects.

So depending on what it is that they're dealing with, then we're able to help them, it doesn't really matter what the diagnosis is.

- So it's all ages?

- All ages, all diagnoses, and going back to your question about flying people within our 10 state region, we can fly people outside of our region too, and we do that through partnerships with other volunteer pilot organizations.

The great thing is there's organizations like ours throughout the country.

We have a 10 state region, but there's other organizations that are also around who we can partner with, if one needs to get to the East Coast or they need to get down to MD Anderson in Houston, Texas, we can fly them there.

- So you have those numbers memorized or, (laughs) praise the Lord for emails, so you can be in touch with people really fast?

- Yeah, we have really great relationships with other organizations, and my mission coordinators, I cannot tout their praises enough, they are amazing, because they know as soon as someone calls them, they begin thinking it through in their head, they're like, okay, I can route them this way, this is where they can go, these are the pilots I know in that area who I'm gonna call on, and if we need a partner, this is the organization we're gonna partner with.

- How long have they been with you, that they know all these things?

- So honestly, we're a pretty new team, I started with the organization two and a half years ago, and one of my mission coordinators has been with us two years, and another one just started about six months ago.

They're quick learners though, and the best thing is, they're passionate about what they do.

Like today we had a phone call from a passenger that this is gonna be the last time we fly her.

We've flown her 41 flight legs, from her home in South Dakota, so she's not actually within our region but she's just outside of it, and she goes to Cancer Treatment Centers of America and Zion, Illinois.

And her cancer, she unfortunately has not been able to beat it, and today they flew her home and she's going on hospice.

And our mission coordinators got that call, and that's heartbreaking for them.

- [Christine] Tugs at their heart, yeah.

- It does 'cause it's someone who they've gotten to know.

- About 41 Missions.

- Yeah, 41 flight legs for this lady back and forth for her and her husband.

And let me tell you, if it wasn't for Lifeline Pilots, she wouldn't have had the last two years, because she wouldn't have been able to get to that treatment.

So we were able to extend her life, and part of that was because of our amazing volunteers.

- So how many other, well, the volunteer pilots, are there other volunteers involved as well or not?

- I mean, it's mainly the volunteer pilots.

I mean, we have a volunteer board of directors, we have a few people that help us with our outreach, but it is mainly the pilots who are volunteering for our organization.

So last year they donated almost a million dollars in flight costs for flying people.

- That's incredible.

And really they take care of the gas and obviously then the maintenance on the plane and all that kind of thing too.

- They do, they're our biggest donor, let me tell you.

We don't receive any government funding, we are completely funded through, - [Christine] They make donations.

- donations, through grants and private donations and then our volunteers, who just give so much, 'cause, yeah, they are giving their time, their expertise, their talent, and then any cost that's involved.

- That's really, really amazing.

There are good people in the world.

- Oh, such good people, it's amazing.

Our pilots, they love to fly, and they are looking for a reason to fly, and what better reason than to help someone in their time in need.

- Right, how did you get involved with it, just two and a half years ago, how did you get involved with Lifeline Pilots?

Did you know about it, are you just looking for a job, you relocated from New Zealand?

- Well, I relocated from New Zealand about, oh, seven years ago now probably.

- [Christine] Oh, okay.

- And so I was working in the local community, I'm from Central Illinois, my husband is from New Zealand, so we were living over there, and we came back to the states so our kids could spend some time with their relatives here, our family here.

And I was working in marketing and fundraising and I wasn't looking for a job, but the job kind of found me.

Someone I knew, sent it to me and I looked at it and I had never heard of Lifeline Pilots.

I didn't know about the organization.

- Well, and again, it's been here for 40 years, - [Lindsey] Yeah.

- and I just found out about it a couple years ago, it's like, how has it been kept so secret?

- Yeah, I know, which is part of the reason they brought me on, to help to spread the word about it.

And when I heard about Lifeline Pilots and I read about their mission, equal access to healthcare is so important to me.

Having lived in another country where there is medicare for all basically, in a country like New Zealand and then coming here where you just see the inequalities with our healthcare system, so to be able to work for an organization that provides that really spoke to me.

And I love Lifeline Pilots, I love being able to talk about the mission.

And so they brought me on to really help with the outreach, with the fundraising and to grow the organization.

- So what has been the most challenging for you at this point with just two and a half years under your belt or whatever?

- Yeah, I mean, of course, the pandemic put a huge stop to what we were doing back two years ago.

When the pandemic first hit, we halted flights, we stopped flying people, because at that time we weren't sure what was happening in the world, like everybody, we kind of went, oh my gosh, it's not safe for us to be transporting people from one state to another.

- Especially if they're compromised some way healthwise, right?

- Yeah, and then when everything started opening back up, in 2020, in the summer of 2020, we started flying again, and at that point, we started helping more people than ever before.

So that's, that was a challenge for us, but overall, our biggest challenge is outreach, being able to tell more people about our service and every time I talk to people, I say, to help more people, we have to tell more people.

- [Christine] That's right.

- And that's why we need every person out there amplifying this message for us, because through social media you can.

With the click of a button you can share the message and you never know who in your circle might need our help.

- Correct, so we'll put this in right now, so what is the Facebook page that we should find, and then what is an email or do you wanna do the Facebook page and then you can link to everything else?

Let's do that now so that I don't forget at the end.

- [Lindsey] Okay, sure.

- All right.

- Sure, so you can find us on Facebook, you just look up Lifeline Pilots on Facebook.

We also have a website, lifelinepilots.org, so anyone who wants additional information about us can go to lifelinepilots.org, and you can find the passenger application, the pilot application, we have lots of videos that tell about what we do and share in more detail, how we work.

But, yeah, we're on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and all of those, you just search Lifeline Pilots and you can find us.

- See how good that is.

What's been the most interesting mission that you have been involved in and help coordinate?

- Wow, that's a great question because they're all just so amazing, but there was one that we did just after we opened back up, post pandemic in 2020, it was about June of 2020 and we had a gentleman who was flying from Minneapolis to Pittsburgh for a kidney transplant.

He was a veteran and so he had to be seen at the Pittsburgh VA Hospital.

And his daughter, who was, his grown daughter, she was donating her kidney to her dad.

- [Christine] Oh, boy!

- And so we had to fly both dad and daughter to Pittsburgh for this procedure, 'cause their doctor said to them, you can't fly commercially.

They were so scared of the pandemic.

- [Christine] Right.

- And they said, you have to fly privately.

And they looked, this couple is newly retired, they looked at each other and they said, we can't afford that, - [Christine] Right.

- how are we gonna do it?

And so their son got on the internet, found us, contacted us, and we said, sure.

So we actually did six flights.

So we did, to get them there, and then six flights home, because dad and mom flew in a plane together, and then the daughter and her brother flew in a plane together.

And it took three flights to get them there, and the surgery was a success, the transplant was a success.

They sent us a family picture of the following Thanksgiving, that we were able to see the family all together, and he was alive because he was able to get that kidney transplant.

- And that's so rewarding.

- So rewarding, but man, it's a lot of work, let me tell you.

(laughs) - Well, now tell me, so you get no funding, you do write for some grants, what types of grants do you get then?

- Oh, oftentimes we're getting grants from small family foundations, the Community Foundation of Central Illinois, they fund us, which is fantastic, but just a lot of private trust.

So like I said, we only have three staff members, so we all do double duty.

One of my mission coordinators, she's my grant and mission coordinator, so she's writing grants as well as coordinating flights, and then I have an outreach admission coordinator, so he's doing a lot of our outreach work and then also coordinating those flights.

So, yeah, she's just constantly looking for new funding and different places where we can apply.

- So the funding goes for salaries for you and what else?

- Sure, so it goes for the facilitation of the flights.

So that includes paying the staff to coordinate the flights, our insurance, to help cover us in the case of an accident.

That's really important for our organization, for the software that we have to use to coordinate those flights, any type of communication that we're needing to do.

So just all of those costs involved in coordinating that flight.

- And you can all work from home really right now, you don't have to go into the office, not everybody has to be there, (clears throat) and you can still coordinate and communicate that way?

- We do a bit of both, we love working in the office when we can, when weather and pandemic allow, because we find that the collaboration is just so wonderful, to be able to sit with your coworkers and share ideas and brainstorm, especially about outreach, how do we reach more people?

- And you've come up with some new ways, like you spoke at the rotary, and you're on this program, and what other ways can you do like an email push or some big social media push?

- Sure, so we do paid social media outreach.

We put post up on our Facebook page and then we pay to boost them so that we can get in front of more people.

We have a grant through Google so that we can be put at the top of those search lists, when people are looking for us.

But we also do paid advertising through Google.

- Do you have to reapply for that grant every year, or?

- We don't, we have certain obligations we have to meet and certify that we're still an operating nonprofit, but it's ongoing, which is great.

And we have billboards throughout the Peoria area.

So we have a collaboration with Adam's Outdoor Advertising and they put our billboards up for free.

So we're finding innovative ways.

Also during the pandemic, one of the bright spots was everybody went virtual.

So I was able to speak to rotary clubs and aviation groups throughout our 10 state region using Zoom.

And it was a great way, I mean, I spoke with thousands of people during that time.

- And did, have you seen results then in terms of donations and that sort of thing?

- We don't always get donations from them, but what we see is we see that they're helping us then, they're being advocates in that area to help with outreach.

Like I was contacted just this last week from someone in Northern Wisconsin who I had spoken to six months ago, and she said, can you send me information I wanna put it up in our local airport.

I'm like, sure, that's great.

And so people are still reaching out to us.

- Good, good, once everything shakes out and they have time to clear their minds and think about things, well, what do you look forward to most then in the future of Lifeline Pilots with all that you're doing?

- Sure, oh, we're going through strategic planning right now and we're really looking forward to these next five years of exponential growth.

We have the capacity with our current pilot group that we have, with those hundreds of pilots, to help so many more people.

And I have a great team on board who are helping with that outreach.

And honestly, I just see that we're going to start to really not be that organization that nobody's heard of, instead be the one that people will hear about someone who is sick and somebody is going to refer us to them.

And so we're really just gonna be able to help more people.

- Well, that's pretty exciting.

Okay, so your staff now, they all have marketing backgrounds, is that how they came to you or they're fairly new as well, how did that all come about?

- My staff are, they come from various backgrounds, my grant admission coordinator, she started with us and way back before she had her child, she worked in marketing and then getting back into the workforce, she actually worked at the airport and worked for one of the airlines, - [Christine] Interesting.

- and then she saw our job, and at first it was only part-time.

And then as soon as I saw what she could do, I recognized that she had the ability to do the writing and she was interested in grants and so we started to get her involved in that.

And she started writing grants for us and the job grew to full time for her.

And then when it came time to hire someone new, we knew we wanted someone with that communications background, and so the person we hired for outreach and mission coordinator role, he has that communications background and is able to help us to really reach more people.

- And do you hear, you said that you do hear from some of the people that you have helped and served, do you hear from a lot of them, get any pictures, some cute crayon pictures from the little kids who have gone here and there and everywhere?

- Yeah, we do, we get some great photos.

Everyone who flies with us, our pilots are taking photos and they're sharing them and we share our mission moments on our social media posts all the time, so that way people who are connected to us can kind of see updates.

And it's great for pilots too 'cause they might have flown someone and then they haven't flown them again since then, - [Christine] Right.

- and then they see our post and they can see another pilot has flown that person and they can see the updates for them.

- How close do they get to the people that they're transporting?

- Oh, sometimes they get very close.

Oftentimes pilots, once they start flying someone, they'll wanna fly them every time that they go.

- And then you guys know that back at the ranch?

- It always goes through us.

- [Christine] Okay.

- Yeah.

Yeah, and it's great for it to go through for us 'cause one, the pilot might not always be available, and two, it then allows the pilot to get credit for that flight, because every flight they do for us, they pay for those costs, but they're tax deductible.

- Oh, that's nice.

- So by going through our system, they're able to get a report at the end of the year that they can use on their taxes.

- Do they have a limit to how many missions they can fly per year?

- Oh, no, there's no limit, and we have some pilots who maybe they're doing one or two flights a month, and other pilots do one or two flights a year.

- So how many, do you average a certain number of flights every month or it can be anything?

- Honestly, it really depends on the weather, - [Christine] Okay.

- because flights get canceled because of the weather, they get postponed.

But we do, we're headed towards about, that we're gonna do about 400 flights flown this year.

- For 2022 or what is your fiscal year?

- Yeah, for our 12 month fiscal year, which is July through June.

- Okay.

- And so we're about a little more than halfway through our fiscal year and, but we're coordinating well over double that, because we're having to coordinate and then sometimes flights get canceled and rescheduled.

- Okay, wow!

- But it's the nature of it.

(laughs) - It's the nature of flight, yes.

So you're good at juggling.

- Yes, yes, we juggle a lot.

(laughs) - Well that is very interesting.

What can we do then to help you just get the word out?

- Sure, yes, share our mission.

If you know a pilot, anywhere in the Midwest, tell the pilot about Lifeline Pilots.

But honestly, if know a pilot anywhere in the country, tell them about flying, becoming a volunteer pilot for whatever volunteer pilot organization is in their area.

And they can find information about us at lifelinepilots.org and that's where the application is.

And then the biggest one is, just share our messages through social media.

- [Christine] And your mission again, the exact wording of it?

- The mission of our organization, so we facilitate free air transportation for people who need to travel for medical or humanitarian needs.

- Okay, and generally they, it's expensive to travel and this helps them with getting the attention they need, the medical attention they need and the financial aid that they can get this way.

- Yeah, that's exactly it.

So for people who contact us, they might have a financial or a medical need, they might not be able to travel because they can't afford it, but they also might not be able to travel because they can't sit in a car for that length of time, or they can't go on a commercial airline because they have a compromised immune system.

So they're able to fly with us, and we don't require that people are destitute to fly with us, because we understand that ongoing medical concerns can be really expensive and taxing on a family's income, so we don't wanna be part of that burden, we wanna relieve that burden for them.

- You are so good.

Well, thank you very much.

Glad that Lifeline Pilots found you.

- Oh, I'm excited to have found them, it's a great mission for me to be able to share.

- Good and that you can share the story.

All right, again, it's lifelinepilots.org.

- That's right, and we also have an 800 number, 808227972.

- Okay, well thank you very much, Lindsey for being with us and sharing all this information, hope you learned a lot, keep it in mind and stay safe and healthy.

(bright upbeat music)