By By GREG KATSKI
Community Editor
At 9:15 a.m. on Thursday, Greater Pamlico Area Chapter of the American Red Cross Executive Director Lorrie Beach got the call she had been dreading.
It was helicopter pilot Tom Tesar saying he couldn’t get clearance to take off from an airport in New Bern because of limited visibility from low-lying fog.
Tesar, of Aurora, had volunteered to fly a helicopter from New Bern to Warren Field Airport in Washington to participate in the GPAC-ARC’s first-ever New Year’s Eve Ball Drop fundraiser.
Tesar and co-pilot Sid Cayton, also of Aurora, were supposed to drop some 750 numbered golf balls from the helicopter while hovering 100 feet off the ground onto a “green” with a carefully placed hole.
The golf balls were bought for $25 each, with a majority of the fundraiser’s proceeds going to the GPAC-ARC’s disaster-relief services.
With the helicopter grounded in New Bern, Beach weighed her options. The alternate plan in case of inclement weather was to pick the top three golf balls out of a bucket, but Beach said she was trying to avoid such a mundane raffle.
“We decided to look for a bucket truck,” said Wayne Sawyer, board chairman of the GPAC-ARC.
The event’s organizers contacted Wayne Woolard, owner of Wayne’s Tree Service in Bath, who agreed to drive a bucket truck to Warren Field Airport for the high noon ball drop.
“He came out spur of the moment,” Sawyer said. “We called him at 10:30 (a.m.). He was sitting at home.”
By noon, Woolard was raising himself up in a ladder bucket to drop three full buckets of golf balls onto a “green” right off the airport’s runway. A crowd of about 100 looked on as he dumped bucket after bucket onto the green from about 70 feet in the air.
When all of the balls were dispersed, the crowd gathered around the “green” to find the winning ball. A single ball had hit the pin and made it into the hole, but that ball had not been bought during the fundraiser. Therefore, volunteers measured to see which ball made it closest to the pin, with Mike Gordon’s No. 890 ball taking first place.
Gordon, who was not present at the ball drop, will collect some $1,850 for having the winning ball.
Sparky Travis placed second and David Ipock took third in the event, but the real winner was the GPAC-ARC.
Sawyer and Beach said the ball drop was the single, most successful fundraiser the GPAC-ARC has ever had.
According to Beach, the event raised some $14,700 for the chapter. That money will provide food, clothing and shelter for 14 families of four displaced by disaster in Beaufort, Hyde, Tyrrell and Washington counties.
“As long as we made money for the Red Cross, it went well,” volunteer Kay Summerfield said.
Beach said the ball drop, which the GPAC-ARC is hoping to make an annual event, is “only going to get better.”
Sawyer and Beach said they expect the nonprofit to sell some 1,200 golf balls for next year’s drop.