Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, November 20, 1994 TAG: 9411220034
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B11 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BILL COCHRAN
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Arrington was preparing for a bow hunt the next day, setting his portable stand about 15 feet up in a wild cherry tree.
``I had hunted over there close to that spot and heard deer going through this pretty large honeysuckle thicket,'' he said. ``I wanted to get the stand up the evening before, so it would be ready the next afternoon.''
Arrington planned to be there after work, the last hour or so before dark, hoping to see a buck move out of the dark thicket, the tips of its antlers bone white, its nostrils flared to test the crisp mountain air.
But he never got back. He plummeted from his stand, crashing to the rocky ground in a fall that has left him paralyzed from the chest down.
As the big guns are uncased for tomorrow's opening of the firearms deer season, Arrington has a message for everyone out looking for deer: You can get hurt very easily.
``Just don't take anything for granted. Tell people to take a little extra time,'' he said from his bed in a Charlottesville rehabilitation center.
Take the time to fasten the safety strap on your tree stand, time to make certain you are wearing enough blaze orange, time to handle your firearm safely, time to tell someone where you plan to hunt and when you plan to return.
Arrington's friends have been haunted by the thought that if it can happen to him, it can happen to anyone. He is an accomplished outdoorsman who operates the family orchard and dresses deer for the Hunters for the Hungry program.
He lives with deer year-round, watching them flash their white tails ghostlike through rows of apple trees in the late summer, and hunting them with bow, then gun, from October into the New Year.
Arrington challenges the gray-muzzled bucks for which Bedford County is famous, the kind that sleep most of the day and move only during low light, pausing to stare down through the hardwoods into the farm fields and orchards before moving a muscle, growing fat and old and wise.
``Bowhunting and muzzleloading is what I like so much,'' he said.
Arrington had pretty well gotten his tree stand erected.
``I had used a [safety] belt to put it up, but I had undone my belt to get up in it. I was checking for some shooting lanes to clear, and I decided to just put my weight on the stand to make sure I had it settled in the tree real good. I didn't hook my belt back up, I just had my hands around the tree. The next thing I knew, I was on the ground.''
Some rocks were grating into the back of Arrington's head, and they were painful, but what really troubled him was he had no feeling or movement through most of his body.
``I did one thing I never did before,'' he said. ``I told somebody where I was going. It started getting dark and they knew to start looking for me.''
Two hours after the fall, three of Arrington's buddies showed up. They knew better than to move him. They called the rescue squad, and Arrington was flown to Roanoke in Life Guard 10, then to Charlottesville.
``I am being told, `Don't be too hopeful. Prepare for the worst, but anything can happen,''' Arrington said.
``If this will make the rest of you boys be a little more careful, that is a help. You know, I could have strapped my belt back on as I got up in the stand. But I didn't.''
by CNB