Loved ones mourn loss of heroic nurse

Karen Zekan

Friday, April 9, 1999 | 11:13 a.m.

Flying was everything to Kathy Batterman.

She had a helicopter mailbox and miniature helicopters all over her home. Even her e-mail address, "rotorfn" -- rotor flight nurse -- captured her all-encompassing love for the job she did in the skies.

Yet seeing her tan flight suit folded atop the table where friends stopped to sign the guest books at Cornerstone Christian Fellowship was the heart-tugging reminder on Thursday that the 44-year-old Valley Hospital flight nurse who had saved thousands of lives in her 19-year career was gone.

Hundreds of friends, family members, coworkers and associates filled the church, all eyes drawn toward the wooden coffin near the pulpit, the framed photo of Batterman and the dozen brightly colored bouquets of chrysanthemum, daisies, lilies and roses.

"With tragedy like this, you may ask the question why -- why risk life to be a flight nurse?" Dr. Phil Wiest said in his eulogy of his close friend with whom he taught and flew with in rescues, and who over the years became like a sister to him. "To Kathy, flying was everything."

Wiest called her "a baby duck" her first night joining the ranks as flight nurse, which was before he became a doctor. "She was new and green in the job ... but she never settled for being good enough. She had to be the very best."

By shift's end, Wiest said Batterman had become "a beautiful swan" as her innate abilities kicked into gear, calmly and quickly transporting several victims of a near-death car crash to the hospital.

There would be many days and nights like that for Batterman, a woman whose fierce confidence and intensity calmed the hearts of the most terrified patients and built her reputation as a hero within the Flight for Life helicopter rescue team, friends said.

"Many of you may not know the smell of kerosene exhaust, the surge of adrenaline that comes when you fly into the unknown," Wiest said. "Being a flight nurse is more than saving lives. It is also a spiritual experience. Flying above the city of lights, you feel closer to God."

Batterman, fellow flight nurse Leroy Shelton, 37, and pilot James Bond, 42, were killed April 3 just before midnight when their Flight for Life B0-105 helicopter crashed near Indian Springs during a return trip to its home base in Pahrump.

A twisted piece of tail and bits of debris scattered across 150 yards of desert were all that remained of the craft, which went down in an approximately two-mile-wide expanse of desert between U.S. 95 and the foothills of the Spring Mountains about 35 miles northwest of Las Vegas.

Investigators sensed that low visibility and bad weather may have been contributing factors. The accident remains under investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board and the Federal Aviation Administration.

A public memorial service honoring the three Flight for Life crew members will be held Tuesday, April 13, 1 p.m., at the North Las Vegas Airport, 4511 W. Cheyenne Ave., hangar 6.

About a dozen friends took turns at the microphone Thursday, sharing favorite memories of Batterman.

Nary a one failed to mention Batterman's chocolate chip cookies -- treats she was known to share with friends at the hospital, give as gifts and pull from her flight suit during times of stress to give hungry teammates.

They praised her for her intensity both in performing the job and teaching the profession to hundreds of paramedics, emergency medical technicians and pilots.

They laughed at her love for pulling pranks and teasing, as well as her sharing with friends the fact that she wore orange underwear to match the orange detailing on her tan flight suit. Flying, they said, was in Batterman's soul.

In a tearful remembrance, Pastor Greg Massanari spoke of Batterman's exuberance for her job and recalled the day she called and asked him to dedicate one of Flight for Life's new helicopters.

Batterman also touched Massanari's life in a way she had for so many other people in Clark County, rescuing the pastor's brother from a plane wreck in Boulder City in 1991.

Batterman was the first certified flight nurse in the United States, a certified emergency nurse, critical care registered nurse, advanced trauma specialist, and pre-hospital nurse practitioner. She also held numerous other trauma certifications.

Her heroic feats were captured on a documentary entitled "American Detective," a videotaped portion of which was shared at the end of Thursday's service.

The film saw Batterman in action, preparing a 28-year-old motorcycle crash victim for transport. It captured the gritty essence of the job as Batterman had to push back into place the victim's dislocated hip to save the man from losing his leg.

"Every time I come back from a flight and I know I'm going back out again, it's a chance to save another life," Batterman said in the clip.

Batterman shared in the film one of the worst things that had ever happened to her in life -- losing her best friend Jessica, a flight nurse, and the pilot of the helicopter when it crashed years ago heading out to Needles, Calif., on a rescue.

"You know the stress is there (in performing rescues)," Batterman said, "but the reward is the greatest feeling in the world."

Teresa Montez, an emergency medical technician with Nye County ambulance services, read aloud a poem written for Batterman to the room filled beyond capacity with many in uniform, including Nevada Highway Patrol, police, paramedics and firefighters from Clark County, Las Vegas, Pahrump and Arizona.

"I am the air, the wind, the rain," Montez read. "I am the sky above."

Batterman is survived by her husband, Kurt, son Christopher, daughter Jennifer, parents Robert and Patricia Mackley, sister Pamela Rowley, and brother David Mackley.