Highlighting Emergency Services Across Province

Heading across the province to meet with emergency service members, local musician and paramedic Nicholas Hennink is shining a light on the people who he believes deserve recognition.

Hennink is in the middle of his "We Are the Warriors" campaign, which puts first responders and emergency services in the spotlight, showing off the real people who you meet and talk with during a crisis.

Recently, he released Canada's first rock music video that showcases emergency service members called "Warriors." The video itself was shot with real police officers, firefighters, paramedics, and physicians from Moose Jaw performing the tasks they would undertake during a real-life emergency situation. This is only one part of the campaign.

"We Are the Warriors" is taking Hennink across the province as he meets and photographs Saskatchewan emergency service members to show all communities who have their backs.

"It was very easy to think of an idea like this because I honestly felt our emergency services needed more recognition. We need to be honoured for the things that we do because the job isn't easy," Hennink said. "The whole idea behind the campaign was to put faces to the heroes that are out there."

Hennink added that these people are the real Warriors.

If you follow Hennink online, you can see he's already seen and met with many organizations throughout the province, but this is just a small fraction of the work.

"There's still so much more to do," Hennink explained. "There's a lot of emergency services in Saskatchewan, and I would be blessed and honoured to be able to meet my quota and get to see as many as possible. I think we're at 22 services right now with about 30 booked."

So far, everyone who has been photographed for the campaign has been supportive and wants to be a part of the initiative.

The ultimate goal, however, is to raise money for OSI Can. Hennink's recent music video raised $1 for each time it was shared, up to $1,000 which was all donated by Aurora Recovery Centre.

After the campaign, Hennink said there are plans in the works for the photographs but they can't release details yet. He did say that OSI Can would be opening a gallery on their website to show off all the photos of emergency members in Saskatchewan.

OSI-CAN is dedicated to helping serving members and veterans of the armed forces, public safety personnel, and first responders. They provide weekly peer support meetings in eight communities in Saskatchewan.

"Individuals can come and discuss the issues that they're dealing with as well as recovery, particularly hope, resilience, and recovery, in a non-judgemental, non-criticized type of environment that is built on anonymity as well," shared Julius Brown, provincial coordinator for OSI-CAN. "It's at the support group level where other issues are identified and then routed through our network of service providers."

Brown said they also provide funding for service dogs and counseling, as well as provide a phone-in support group for those in remote communities or dealing with mobility issues. He encourages people to reach out for help, explaining that the holiday season can be a stressful time, especially for those already dealing with operational stress injury (OSI) and post-traumatic stress injury.

With so much work to do still, you can keep up with Hennink's progress on his Facebook page.