Since Applefest began in 1989 as a simple harvest celebration it has grown into one of the Hudson Valley’s largest events, attracting tens of thousands of visitors traveling from neighboring states to experience the extraordinary variety of Warwick’s orchards and entertainment, and now requires a large, sophisticated deployment of health and welfare professionals from the Warwick EMS, an all volunteer organization, providing emergency medical care and transportation services for residents and visitors throughout the community.
This year the festival organizers were blessed with an especially beautiful day, with temperatures in the 70s and a clear, crisp sky, attracting an especially large crowd of visitors whose cars nearly overflowed the designated parking lots and every available place along the major streets of the Village of Warwick. Conditions like these may challenge the resources of most communities, but Warwick’s EMS team was well-equipped with two sophisticated ambulances, an all-terrain six-wheeled ATV, and two EMTs on bikes, who were well-trained and experienced in handling large crowds and prepared for would-be emergency situations. Also covering the event was a rig from the Greenwood Lake Ambulance Corps as well. Plus they have emergency access to many additional resources offered by the County and New York State.
“Warwick’s EMS is a great group of community minded people. While most members have full-time jobs or are retired they are just looking for ways to give back to the town, to the community,” described Warwick Town Supervisor, Jesse Dwyer, an active EMT with the Warwick EMS Corps, and for more than five years served as a member of the Greenwood Lake Volunteer Ambulance Corps, who honored him as Corpsman of the Year in 2020. “Warwick’s EMS is unique,” Jesse continued, “when you’re doing such challenging work and for no pay, that would turn most average people away and make them quit. But when you have a great organization with great leaders and great members it motivates you to continue doing the good work that’s needed in the town.”
Warwick EMS covers the Villages of Florida and Warwick; the Village of Greenwood Lake and the hamlet of Pine Island have their own ambulance corps. “We all cover each other, ” explained Dwyer. “It can happen where either you’re operating multiple incidents at a time, or where you don’t have enough crews or enough rigs to cover a call, so we back each other up from Pine Island to Florida to Greenwood Lake. And in some cases we go to other towns; Chester, for example, doesn’t have any EMS units so oftentimes Greenwood Lake and Warwick will travel to Chester to back them up. But we look at it as any community or group who needs help we’re always there for them.”
Founded in 1942, the Warwick EMS Corps is the second oldest in the State of New York. It became certified in New York in 1990 with forty-five active members, twenty-six of whom are EMTs. Warwick EMS [WarwickEMS.com] offers 24/7 emergency medical services for the sick or injured in the community. Their teams carry a defibrillator in all of their ambulances. They have certified instructors for both American Heart Association CPR & American Red Cross First Aid (with training is available for members & the general public). In addition, during every first Saturday of the month, they run a free Blood Pressure Clinic at 146 South Street Ext. in Warwick from 10am to 12pm.
Photo credit: Peter Lyons Hall
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