SEQUIM — Susan Strand, one of the Army’s first women helicopter pilots, christened Sequim’s new emergency helipad near Olympic Medical Center’s Sequim Cancer Center on Thursday.

Strand broke a bottle of champagne over a fence post near the marker bearing her name, saying that the helipad — which is adjacent to the Jamestown Family Health Center and the cancer center east of North Fifth Avenue — would “save lives in the area.”

Strand said she chose to donate $50,000 to the $120,000 helipad after a Coast Guard rescue helicopter airlifted her mother, Marjorie, in 2002 to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle after she suffered a heart attack in an ambulance transporting her to OMC in Port Angeles.

Strand has been retired in Sequim for 10 years.

“To me, it’s not the amount you give; it’s just giving,” she told first responders, hospital executives and Sequim Dungeness Hospital Guild members — who donated $40,000 to the helipad, which replaces the Sequim High School playfield site used in the past.

After an MH-65C rescue helicopter from Air Station/Sector Field Office Port Angeles landed at the helipad, Strand walked on the newly painted pad, which is equipped with night lights for 24-hour landings, and greeted the crew.

“These people risk their lives” to help save others, she said.

OMC Commissioner Jim Leskinovitch, who along with hospital Chief Executive Officer Eric Lewis led the ceremony, said the helipad would help the community now and in the future.

“I’m just thrilled personally as a Coast Guard pilot retired,” Leskinovitch said.

“This is a real boon to the people of the city of Sequim.”

Leskinovitch, who had a hand in planning the helipad, said it was designed to handle larger SH-60 Seahawk helicopters in the 20,000-pound range.

That will benefit the area in the event of a disaster, he said.

Fire District No. 3 Chief Steve Vogel, after receiving the hospital guild’s donation, said the helipad eliminates the days when students from Sequim High School’s playfield had to be cleared to make it safe for air-ambulance helicopters to land, pick up and transport sick or seriously injured patients to Port Angeles or Seattle hospitals.

The dedication was followed by a tour of OMC’s new Varian TrueBeam cancer treatment technology at the hospital’s Sequim Cancer Center, 844 N. Fifth Ave.

The Sequim-based cancer center has expanded its radiotherapy capabilities with the Varian TrueBeam, the most advanced linear accelerator available today and the only such technology on the West Coast north of Stanford, Calif., hospital representatives said.

“It’s a great machine,” cancer center radiation oncologist Rena Zimmerman told a tour group of about 30.

“It’s like going from the 10-speed I had when I was a kid to a 7 Series BMW,” she said.

“I can’t tell you how truly amazing it is to have this in the community. We are at the forefront of radiation treatment in the community.”

The TrueBeam will enable the cancer center to treat up to 40 patients a day, Zimmerman said, adding that it means few patients will have to leave the North Olympic Peninsula for treatment elsewhere.

The $2.7 million Varian Truebeam system uses lasers for precision treatment of cancer, said radiation therapist Julie Crews.

“This is the biggest technology advance that we have had,” Lewis said of the Varian Truebeam.

Lewis said the advancement makes the Thomas Family Cancer Center in Sequim a “world-class” facility, conveniently housing radiation oncology and medical oncology under one roof.

Services include radiation therapy, chemotherapy, infusion services, hematology, dietary services, PET/CT and an on-site pharmacy, as well as a resource room for patients and their loved ones.

________

Sequim-Dungeness Valley Editor Jeff Chew can be reached at 360-681-2391 or at jeff.chew@peninsuladailynews.com.