Sweetwater

A helicopter hangar provides the canvas for the 42^nd mural in the 39^th county in the campaign.

The 50-foot-wide mural is painted in Sweetwater on the UT Lifestar base helicopter hangar and is visible to more than 43,300 travelers a day on I-75.

“I think that ‘Everywhere You Look, UT’ will make the helipad pop and draw people’s attention to it, especially Tennesseans that are used to seeing these murals all over the state. It may even invoke a reaction like ‘Hey, I didn’t realize there was a UT helicopter over there,’” said life-long UT Knoxville fan and Med-Trans Regional Business Operations Director David Bowman.

Bowman was born into the UT Knoxville fan base; his father attended UT Knoxville.  “I have two boys, and I had one in a little Tennessee Vol’s onesie before he even came home from the hospital,” Bowman said.

When the opportunity arose, thanks to the combination of multiple UT staff, to paint an, “Everywhere You Look, UT” mural on a UT Lifestar helicopter base, Bowman couldn’t pass it up.

UT Lifestar is a partnership between the University of Tennessee Medical Center and Med-Trans. Med-Trans provides the medical supplies, pilots and mechanics and the University of Tennessee Medical Center contributes the clinicians and performs the medical care.

UT Lifestar has five bases in Tennessee, with the main one at the University of Tennessee Medical Center in Knoxville. It provides rapid transport of more than 2,200 critical care patients each year across the East Tennessee region, which includes Southeast Kentucky, Southwest Virginia and Western North Carolina.

“I think the mural furthers the statement that we’re here, at UT Medical Center, UT Lifestar, just UT overall. We are in Monroe County, McMinn County and in your community, we’re there,” said UT Lifestar Program Director Phyllis Walker, who is also a UT Knoxville alumna.

The mural was completed in September 2023.