Southern Berkshire Ambulance

10/09/2026

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, and this weekend there will be approximately 47 million pictures taken of the foliage, every one of them captioned with some version of “peak color” and sent to a relative who lives somewhere with palm trees.

But in EMS, sometimes we have to do the opposite. We have to take what we are seeing, hearing, smelling, measuring and figuring out in the back of an ambulance, then turn it into enough words that the hospital can clearly picture exactly what is coming through their doors. That is an art form.

So today, as the Berkshires show off every shade of red, orange, yellow and gold, we give a shoutout to one of Southern Berkshire Ambulance’s own verbal Picassos. The man himself may be seriously lacking in pigmentation, somewhere between “winter white” and “printer paper,” but when it comes to painting a picture with words, apparently he has the entire 64-count Crayola box at his disposal.

His reports do not simply say, “Patient doesn’t look good.” By the time he is finished, the hospital knows what the patient looks like, what happened, what we found, what we did, what changed, what did not change, and probably what the patient had for breakfast three Tuesdays ago.

So while everyone else is out admiring the fall colors this weekend, remember that some of our finest artwork is being created under fluorescent lights, at 60 miles an hour, with a laptop balanced on somebody’s knee. No easel, no paintbrush, just a radio, a report, and enough descriptive language to make Bob Ross say, “Maybe dial it back a little.”

Ready to Serve. Proud to Care.

10/08/2026

Ladies and Gentlemen, We Need Your Support!

Two New Ambulances. Six Towns. One Shared Commitment.

At Great Barrington’s Special Town Meeting on October 19, voters will be asked to approve $47,838 as the town’s share of funding for two replacement ambulances for Southern Berkshire Ambulance Squad.

Here are the facts.

Our existing ambulances have reached the end of their useful service lives. With new ambulances taking nearly two years to build, we planned ahead. Both replacements are already on order, with the first expected this winter and the second early next summer.

The cost is shared among the six towns we serve: Alford, Egremont, Great Barrington, Monterey, Mount Washington, and Sheffield. The other five towns approved their shares in May. Great Barrington’s funding was postponed while a long-term service agreement was finalized. That three-year agreement is now signed, and while our commitment to Great Barrington has never wavered, it is now official.

As a nonprofit, SBAS has secured favorable financing and continues private fundraising to minimize the burden on our communities. We are taxpayers too, and we understand that every dollar matters because this comes out of our pockets as well. To put the request in perspective, $47,838 works out to roughly $12 per Great Barrington household, a dollar a month. That's less than the cost of a candy bar each month to help keep dependable ambulances serving our community.

We also know that reliable emergency medical care requires reliable equipment. Our crews respond around the clock, in every season and every kind of weather. When someone calls 911, our responsibility is to have the people, equipment and ambulances ready to respond.

We value our partnership with all six towns and appreciate the responsibility that comes with spending taxpayer dollars. We respectfully ask Great Barrington voters to support this important investment at the October 19 Special Town Meeting.

Six towns. One ambulance service. A shared responsibility to keep our communities safe.

Ready to Serve. Proud to Care.

Southern Berkshire Ambulance is there for you in every kind of weather, every hour of the day, every day of the year.

10/07/2026

October is Sudden Cardiac Arrest Awareness Month, and this is one of those topics where a few minutes and a few simple actions can make all the difference.

Sudden cardiac arrest can happen anywhere - at home, at work, in the grocery store, at a ballgame, or sitting at Mom's Country Cafe or Harmony Market in South Egremont with someone you have known for 40 years. When it happens, the most important person during those first few minutes may not be the EMT or paramedic, it may be you.

If someone suddenly collapses, is unresponsive, and is not breathing normally, call 911, start CPR, and get an AED if one is available. You do not need to wait for an ambulance to arrive before you start helping, you do not need a medical degree, and you do not need to worry about doing everything perfectly.

Push hard and fast in the center of the chest and keep going until help arrives or an AED tells you what to do. AEDs are designed for ordinary people to use, and once you turn one on, it will walk you through the process and will not deliver a shock unless one is needed.

Those first few minutes matter tremendously, especially here in the Berkshires where the closest ambulance may be several towns away, several miles down the road, and on the other side of more than a few hills and curves. Many of our “saves” have been because people around knew what to do until we got there. Rest assured, we are on our way, and if in South Egremont, Joe and the Egremont Fire Department will be there quickly.

Learn CPR, know where the AED is at your workplace, school, gym, church, or community building, and if someone goes down, do not stand there wondering whether somebody else should step in.

Be the somebody - We will be coming as quickly as we can.

Ready to Serve. Proud to Care.

10/06/2026

Thanks to the fine folks at The Berkshire Edge for sharing a great letter from our very own Jake Clinton (link in the comments).

We’re heading into that special time of year when visitors flock to the Berkshires to hike, take in the foliage, and apparently all arrive at Monument Mountain at exactly the same time. Good luck finding a parking spot there this weekend. You may need a rescue team just to get from your car to the trailhead.

With more people getting outside, though, comes the occasional call for help in places where an ambulance cannot exactly back up to the front door.

We also recognizes the reality facing many of our local fire departments. Membership is down, manpower is limited, and the days of calling the fire department and having a dozen people show up to handle all of the “heavy lifting” are all but something you see in pictures. We saw that need and decided we needed to be part of the solution.

SBA invested in the equipment and specialized training necessary for rope rescue and patient removal from difficult terrain. More importantly, we’re extremely proud of the members of our crew who took the time to train, practice, learn the systems, tie the knots, haul the ropes, and develop a skill set that goes well beyond what most people picture when they think of an ambulance crew. For those of you who thought we couldn’t tie knots because our boots have zippers – you’re wrong.

Rope rescue doesn’t necessarily mean somebody dangling off the side of Monument Mountain or the AT, it might be a hiking trail, a steep embankment, somebody down over a guardrail - Or, as these photos show, it might simply be a riverbank off a quiet Berkshire side street where “the patient is right down there” suddenly turns into a much bigger project.

That’s small-town emergency services. You never quite know where the next call is going to take you, so you prepare for the places the ambulance can’t.

Ready to Serve. Proud to Care.

10/04/2026

Chances are if you are on Facebook, you are exactly the right age to remember October 4, 1987. The forecast was basically cold rain. Snow was not really on anyone’s radar. Then Mother Nature looked at the Berkshires and apparently decided we were getting too comfortable.

We are generally pretty resilient when it comes to winter weather, but this one was different. Trees were still full of leaves, the heavy snow piled on, power went out, roads became a mess and everything got strangely quiet. Quiet, that is, until you heard the unmistakable “crack…thump” of another tree limb coming down. If you lived here, you remember that sound.

Four-wheel drive does not make you invincible and it certainly does not repeal the laws of physics, but when the roads turn into a mix of snow, trees and hold my b**r challenges, it sure helps. That is one reason both of the new ambulances we have on order will be equipped with four-wheel drive, something you do not find on most ambulances.

Around here, “bad weather” can mean six different things before breakfast. We cannot control the snow, ice, mud, hills or downed trees, but we can prepare for them. Our job is to get to you when you need us, even when the storm nobody saw coming decides to show up.

Hopefully October 4, 1987 stays exactly where it belongs, in the stories we tell about “that storm.” But if Mother Nature ever wants a rematch, we intend to be ready.

Ready to Serve. Proud to Care.

10/02/2026

Friday night lights are back as the Spartans take on Belchertown tonight (10/2/26).

The MIAA requires an EMT at football games, but Monument Mountain Regional High School also sees the value in having medical coverage at many of its higher-contact sporting events, which, frankly, is a pretty good idea. Think about it - an ambulance is about 13 minutes away under perfect conditions, after someone notices the problem, finds a phone and tilts their head just right to get cell service to call 911, explains which field they are actually on, and convinces everyone standing in the driveway to move their cars, it is probably better to already have an EMT standing on the sideline.

Our EMTs are there to handle injuries, watch for anything concerning and provide immediate care while additional resources are on the way. It also means we do not have to find out whether Coach remembers the medical portion of that certification class he took back when flip phones were still impressive.

And because this is Southern Berkshire County, “EMT standby” can come with a few additional duties. At soccer, that apparently includes ball boy. One minute you are ready to assess an injury, the next, you are chasing a soccer ball down the hill while a bunch of teenagers quietly judge your speed.

We are proud to support Monument Mountain athletics, our student-athletes, coaches, families and the community.

Hopefully tonight the only thing getting carried off the field is a victory.

Go Monument.

Ready to Serve. Proud to Care.

09/28/2026

And you wonder why we have to number our ambulances so we can tell them apart?

One of these things is definitely not like the others. See if you can spot Southern Berkshire Ambulance hiding in a sea of Sunshine Orange.

More than 112 orange Subies rolled through Great Barrington, with cars traveling from Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Hampshire, New York, Vermont, Tennessee, Washington D.C., Pennsylvania, New Jersey and, somehow, even Wisconsin. For a few minutes, Great Barrington looked like somebody spilled a giant bucket of orange paint across town.

Our ambulance did its best to blend in. It failed - we were like a marshmallow in a bag of Cheetos.

Congratulations to the organizers on an incredible turnout and a very cool event. Thanks for bringing everyone through Great Barrington and giving us possibly the easiest game of "One of These Things Is Not Like the Others" we've ever played - bringing a whole lot of color to Southern Berkshire County on dreary weekend..

Now, seriously… can you find our rig in the parking lot? Hint: It's not the orange one.

Ready to Serve, Proud to Care.

09/22/2026

Empower Yourself. Protect Your Family. Stop the Bleed.

Learn tools and skills that can help you "Stop the Bleed". Training is FREE and open to the public. Registration is required.

07/01/2026

After months of contentious negotiations over funding increases that the town felt were unsustainable, Great Barrington and Southern Berkshire Ambulance Squad agreed to a three-year contract—locking…