An article from www.pressdemocrat.com
Article published - Oct 3, 2005

Ex-Petaluman dies in copter crash

By Katy Hillenmeyer
THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

Authorities are investigating the cause of a helicopter crash near Seattle that killed former Petaluman Erin Eachus Reed, 30 years after her burns in a local firebombing drove her to a career treating trauma patients.

Reed's family said they learned Saturday that search crews had pulled her remains from Puget Sound, where the medical-transport helicopter she was working aboard went down outside Edmonds, Wash., Thursday night.

"She was an adrenaline junkie and she was a great nurse," sister Stacey Friedman of Sacramento said Sunday.

Reed, a 48-year-old who worked in Sonoma and Marin counties as a paramedic during the 1980s, had just helped transport a patient to a Seattle hospital and was returning with two co-workers to their airport base in Arlington, Wash., a Seattle colleague said Sunday.

The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating what caused the aircraft to plunge into the sound in an area called Browns Bay. But Friedman said a 911 caller reported hearing an explosion after the helicopter flew overhead sometime after 9 p.m. Thursday.

Authorities searched extensively for Reed's crewmates, pediatric nurse Lois Suzuki, 47, and pilot Steve Smith, 59, Friedman said. They were presumed dead.

Toni Long, executive vice president for finance and administration at Seattle-based Airlift Northwest, said Reed brought her employer valuable experience as a paramedic.

"She was passionate about the mission, and clinically she was excellent," said Long, recalling Reed's eight years aboard Airlift's transport helicopters. "She was a superb flight nurse."

On Aug. 23, 1975, Reed suffered third-degree burns over 30 percent of her body after a Molotov cocktail exploded on the crowded porch of a Lakeville Highway home during a party. An 18-year-old Petaluma student was later charged with tossing the device onto the roof of the rural home, injuring eight people.

The 1975 Casa Grande High graduate was among two teens seriously burned that night, and spent three months recuperating at St. Francis Memorial Hospital burn center in San Francisco, her sister recalled.

She had to forego a scholarship to the University of Southern California that year, because rehabilitation prevented her from starting pre-med studies there.

But "she's always been in the emergency medical field" since recovering from her burns, her sister said, starting with EMT training she completed at Santa Rosa Junior College in 1981.

After working for Cadle's Mercy Ambulance in Santa Rosa and on the Sonoma County Sheriff's helicopter, she joined the Marin County Fire Department in the mid-1980s before pursuing nursing degrees in Massachusetts and Tennessee.

In addition to her sister, Reed is survived by her brother, Richard Jeffrey Eachus of Santa Rosa; her father, Richard Eachus of Kona, Hawaii; and her mother, Sandra Brians of Folsom. Survivors also include stepsiblings Tami Brumley of Folsom and Trisha Novotny of Gig Harbor, Wash.

Reed and her crewmates will be memorialized Thursday at an 11 a.m. service at Seattle's King County International Airport. The family is planning a Sonoma County service late this month.