Congrats to Natalie Aulwes

The Girl Scouts of America has awarded our hometown ski patroller Natalie Aulwes with its highest honor – the 2020 National Gold Award Girl Scout.

She designed and built a ski patrol helipad at Pajarito at the top of the Townsight lift that runs on solar power. In an interview with KRQE, Aulwes said: 

“I wanted to do something to give back to Ski Patrol and everything they’ve done for me, one of the problems we were having was getting our patients efficiently to our old helicopter pad.”

Aulwes said part of the problem was transferring the patients from the sled to the ambulance, then to the helicopter pad because moving the patient after an injury can oftentimes make it worse. She found a new location for a second helicopter pad which sits at the top of the mountain.

“We did that because from that position we could just hook up the sled to the back of a snowmobile and just drive it up (to the helicopter pad),” Aulwes said.

Tom Long said, “Natalie is one of those rare people. She’s a visionary and a hard worker and we’re proud of what she’s accomplished. Tremendous congratulations – she’s earned it.”