ATLANTA (BP)–The Georgia Baptist Convention has established a scholarship fund for the children of the three Life Flight crew members killed during a helicopter crash last July.
Attendees at the convention’s annual meeting in Savannah, along with Georgia Baptist Health Care System officials, honored the sacrifice made by flight nurse Renee Welch Chapman, flight paramedic Michael Elam and pilot Bart Bradshaw by announcing the scholarship and praying for the victims’ families.
J. Robert White, GBC executive director, presented each family with a plaque commemorating the professional service and Christian commitment of the three Baptist Life Flight crew members during the November convention in Savannah.
The children of the crash victims can receive a full scholarship to any one of the four Georgia Baptist colleges. The scholarship fund provides for the college education of the three children conditional only upon meeting standard academic acceptance criteria at those schools.
Life Flight pilot Bart Bradshaw was the father of two young children: a son, Austin Blake Bradshaw, who was born in September 1996 and a daughter, Madisen Taylor, who was born in December 1999. Michael Elam’s daughter, McKenzie Ray Elam, was born 27 days after the Aug. 19 crash.
The Baptist Life Flight crew crashed during a return trip from Savannah at approximately 2 a.m. on July 24.
Baptist Health Care System President Frank Upchurch said the three crew members were “deeply committed to Christ and performed their duties out of a deep sense of God’s calling upon their lives.”
“For their ultimate sacrifice,” Upchurch said, “Georgia Baptists with all Georgians will continue thanking God for the lives they lived and for the worthiness of how they died.”
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(BP) photo posted in the BP Photo Library at www.bpnews.net. Photo title: Life Flight.
