This is a picture taken at the early morning, around 6:00 when the first masses of pilgrims were arriving. And some order of Malta people in black boilersuits and this very fashionable womans dresses, pushed a couple of people on wheelchairs onto the field. In total there were more then 100.000 people in attendance and it takes a while for those to get onto the field and back again.
The pope then held the mass from this great white stage, then had lunch with some cardinals, held a speech in the concert room and then went back home.
If you wonder, why I show you a picture from the inside of a fire service command truck, its because there I was able to hear and see parts of the service. The Malteser had about 1500 people around, everything from cooking to doctors and paramedics who would treat injured or sick pilgrims. We had fantasti cooperation not only from the guys of the local volunteer fire brigade who were near us, but as well from the Malteser from Memmingen who did the dispatch and worked thoroughly only with very little sleep during the night and of course the very funny and niece guys from the police in the Palatinate and Bavaria.
From the press release I have learned that we have treated 387 people, brought 33 to a hospital and had more then 50 vehicles deployed, which 1500 people helped. This is certainly the biggest mission the Freiburg Malteser have ever done.
This is also a picture from our parking area, where not only the ambulances for potentially sick people on the field would park, but the fire brigade and the local dispatchers in their car. Behind us the police, a helicopter just starting and the Neue Messe in which we had the medical centre. In the dusk the blackforrest and the Münster.
Amoingst other cars, trucks, ambulances, motorbikes, the Freiburg Malteser had deployed our „Iltis“ a 1970s army jeep vehicle, that we got cheap from some other Malteser local association.
For those of you who are wondering, why I had time to take pictures: I was a guide to the ambulances from outside Freiburg, but luckily we didn’t have to do so much and they found their way around quite well, so I had some time to take pictures and of course support the dispatchers who had oversight over the units on the field.
More pictures at my flickr stream
A more general article about the Popes Visit can be found at the New York Times Website.