EMS cross-country procession stops by Texas Panhandle War Memorial en route to Arlington

The National EMS (Emergency Medical Services) Memorial Service and Weekend of Honor Moving Honors Procession held a ceremony Wednesday at the Texas Panhandle War Memorial Center in Amarillo.

The cross-country procession was joined by the National EMS Bike Ride and American Medical Response for the ninth stop of their 21-city journey, which started in Seattle and will end in Arlington, Virginia, on July 20 during the weekend of honor.

With this event, emergency responders lost in the line of duty are honored and added to the Tree of Life Memorial. This year’s event honors 36 first responders who were lost in the line of duty. The National EMS Memorial Service has been congressionally sanctioned to conduct its annual service.

At the ceremony, this year's list of names of those lost in the line of duty were read, with a flyover from an EMS helicopter. Amarillo City Councilman and firefighter Josh Craft was the featured speaker.

Megan Haverkamp, the described crew chief of the moving memorial with Global Medical Response, spoke about the multistate journey.

“We will go through 18 states covering about 4,800 miles to our final destination, honoring those EMS personnel that paid the ultimate sacrifice in the line of duty,” she said. “When we reach our final destination, we bring the families of these EMS personnel to honor them. Each family will be given a flag, a white rose and a challenge coin as a small token of their loved one’s service.”

Haverkamp emphasized that this moving honor memorial procession is to make sure that these brave men and women are remembered. “It helps to show these family members that their loved ones are not forgotten,” she added.

One of the items given at the ceremony to children of lost loved ones is a stuffed bear named Chief Teddy Bear to help bring them comfort.

“Children do not often realize what is going on, and the bear helps bring them comfort with a story with the bear, so that they realize that their loved ones will not be forgotten,” she said. “Seeing it firsthand, the children really connect with the bear.”

She said that this was the fourth year of the Moving Honor Procession and that all honorees will have a short biography on the website.

The directory of previous honorees includes several Texans, including six who were with Amarillo agencies and died in medical flight crashes in 2000 and 2010. To find out more about the Moving Honor Procession and to see all EMS honorees, go to: https://www.national-ems-memorial.org/events-2/moving-honors/ .

This article originally appeared on Amarillo Globe-News: EMS moving honors procession holds ceremony at TX war memorial