by Karla Wilson

Williams, who represents BCEHS as our ‘Helijet Santa’, has always lived a life of giving. Now, his annual holiday gig provides a magical experience for hundreds of children across B.C. in hospital during the holiday season.

Williams has been playing Santa Claus in some form or other for the past 40 years. What began as dressing up and walking down his street, delivering candy canes to neighbourhood children, has since grown into a much bigger undertaking. Steve has volunteered countless hours for the Shine Foundation with life partner Deborah Cherry and mingled as Kris Kringle at more charitable and corporate events than he can count.

With his combination of Santa Claus experience and an inherently compassionate nature, one might say that Williams’ role as Helijet Santa is a perfect fit.

Steve Williams as Santa Claus in November 2023

Steve Williams grew up in Sayward - a small community on the northeast coast of Vancouver Island. With a population of about 1,200 people at the time, he initially started a career in logging, then became the village’s first municipal employee in 1972. With so few people in the village, residents with first aid credentials, like Williams, volunteered to be part of a group of community first responders.

In 1974, Williams noticed a BC Ambulance Service vehicle in the Kelsey Bay ferry line- up. He struck up a conversation with the driver and passengers, who were BC Ambulance trainers on their way to Port McNeill and Port Hardy to train new paramedics.

Not long after, an opportunity came up for Williams to take a government-funded paramedic training course in Campbell River. Lo and behold, the same trainers from the ferry line-up were his instructors, and one of them encouraged him to pursue a full-time paramedic career in Vancouver – the only station locations hiring full-time employees at that time.

Although it would be a huge life change for Williams and his family, they agreed he should apply for a role in Vancouver. After an initial hiring freeze followed by a year-long wait due to a long list of excited prospects, Williams finally received a phone call to travel to Vancouver for an interview.

On June 13, 1977, Williams worked his first shift with the BC Ambulance Service. At the time, there was only one ambulance operating in Surrey. His ambulance partner was Harvey Bull – a paramedic known for his huge heart and, ironically, his no-bull approach. Harvey had a nickname for almost everyone he crossed paths with. He gave Williams his nickname on their first day working together, and it remained with him for the next forty years.

“My day started with a fatality,” Williams says. “I did four more fatalities in that day. Everything was critical and nobody survived. I was standing in the emergency department at the Royal Columbian Hospital, and I could see my partner with the head nurse at the nurse’s station, looking my way. He finally put his elbow on my shoulder and said: ‘This isn’t usual, Greenhorn – this doesn’t happen every day.’ I did nine more years with Harvey, and he was the best partner I’ve ever had.”

Williams continued to work in Surrey for those nine years, then moved to various ambulance stations throughout the lower mainland. In the late 1980s at the North Vancouver ambulance station, Williams injured his elbow while lifting a patient. The injury required seven surgeries and ended his paramedic career.

“They allowed me to try and qualify in dispatch in 1999,” Williams recalls. “No injured crew member had gone into dispatch and been successful, but I became great at multi- tasking and became a call-taker and dispatcher. I ended up being a dispatch supervisor until I retired.”

In 2013, Williams retired from BCEHS after 36 years of service. Eight years and four terms ago, he became president of the BCAS 10-7 Association Society, an organization that supports retired BCEHS paramedics. He also leads the Fraser Valley chapter of the Pharoahs Car Club of B.C., whose second annual charity car show recently raised  $15,000. And, of course, he continues to work as Santa.

“After I retired, I started to grow a beard and make it real,” Williams says. “I ended up doing things like Toys for Tots and Cruise for Kids and a few corporate events. I also joined a professional Santas organization – we have a local chapter in the Lower Mainland.”

It was at one of these meetings that he met the previous Helijet Santa.

“When I found out, I said: ‘You have my gig. I want what you do.’”, Williams recalls.

In early 2023, Williams received the phone call he’d be waiting for from the previous Helijet man in red. “Early last year, he phoned and said ‘Steve, I can’t do it anymore. I’m going to nominate you’.”

Williams excelled in his meet-and-greets with Helijet and BCEHS executive and on December 12, 2023, took his inaugural helicopter ride as Helijet Santa.

In 2023, the Santa flight itinerary included stops at Victoria General Hospital, Nanaimo Regional General Hospital, BC Childrens & BC Woman’s Hospital, Abbotsford Regional Hospital, Surrey Memorial Hospital and Royal Columbian Hospital. At each location on the flight, at least one patient and their family is selected to greet Santa as he exits the helicopter. Santa follows up this meet and greet by visiting other children throughout the hospital and passing out gifts.

“To watch these kids who are there with a whole variety of illnesses and injuries and so on, from an ashen, grey, sad situation – all of a sudden you see a sparkle in their eyes and their skin pinks up and there’s a smile on their face,” Williams says. “Then the family gets teary because they haven’t seen this from their child for a long time.”

“That is the most honourable, privileged and emotional thing that I’ve ever done,” Williams continues. “I love choppers, so the excitement of the chopper is just overwhelming to me. I got goosebumps and I had them throughout the whole day every time we lifted off and sat back down again. And when I say honourable, privileged, and emotional – I have never felt the emotions as visiting those kids in hospitals, ever. The emotions of that were over the top.”

Williams owns three different Santa suits – including one famously worn by Kurt Russell in the 2018 Netflix film The Christmas Chronicles. He says it takes him between 20-30 minutes to transition from Steve into Santa.

Williams’ 2024 Christmas schedule is as chockfull of events as one might expect, and ranges from private events at the Sheraton Wall Centre to a televised charity event at the Fairmont Hotel in downtown Vancouver. He also works with the Ambulance Paramedics of BC union to visit dozens of paramedic crews at hospital emergency departments on the Lower Mainland.

But, despite a packed holiday schedule, when asked how long he intends to keep his role Helijet Santa, Steve’s response is crystal clear:

“Until I can’t crawl into the helicopter anymore,” he says. “I will do this as long as I possibly can.”

2024 will mark the 20th year that BCEHS and Helijet have partnered with hospitals to bring toys and warm wishes to kids across Vancouver Island and the Lower Mainland.

This year’s Santa flight will take place on December 10.