Early in January 2009, the temperature in Tanana, Alaska, fell to 55 below zero F. It was so cold that when the airport runway lights stopped working, crews were 1 from going outside to fix them.
So it was a real concern when Vicky Aldridge, a nurse practitioner at the village health center, realized that 61-year-old Winkler Bifelt was bleeding 2 and needed medical treatment at Fairbanks Memorial Hospital, 3 150 miles away. The sun was already down when Aldridge made the 4 telephone call to Frontier Flying Service in Fairbanks.
"We told them the only way we could fly was if they could find enough vehicles to 5 the runway with headlights so we could land," said Bob Hajdukovich, the company’s president. Aldridge’s next calls went to airport and town officials, who, 6 , called villagers. Forty-five minutes later, enough cars, trucks, minivans and snowmobiles had lined up so that the runway was 7 .
Pilots Nate Thompson and David Fowler landed without 8 , and then took off again, with Bifelt.
"There is this wonderful caring 9 in the village," Aldridge said. "If anyone needs anything, all I have to do is to call one or two people and everything will get 10 ."