Speaker , Wings-Flights Of Hope-Joe DeMarco
Posted by Vern Anderson
on Oct 20, 2014
- Wings-Flights of Hope was founded by Joe DeMarco
- Joe was a co-pilot with Dr. D’Angelo and mason contractor by profession. Once he saw the impact of these flights it was a turnaround moment for him and he gave up his contracting business to focus on wings.
- Wings is run by donations and volunteer pilots.
- Wings has two planes (one courtesy of Ingram Micro) and some of the pilots have their own planes.
- They fly patients as well as families any time and anywhere in the Northeast corridor . Beyond the 2 hour radius they work out a link service and work with other pilots to get the patients closer to their destination.
- Mostly handle cancer and transplant patients who cannot user commercial airline services either due to immune deficiency, financial constraints or in the case of transplant patients time sensitivity to organ availability.
- All they require is proof of a valid appointment and a doctor’s release that it is ok for the patient to fly.
- For legal and liability reasons they ask the patient and family to sign a liability waiver.
- They do not charge as compared to mercy flights which does have a per trip charge. Wings is a free service and solely dependent upon their fund raising and donations.
- There is a fund raiser for wings on November 7th. Information can be found on the wings website.
- Joe Demarco Founder & Pilot – Website www.wingsflight.org for more details