CFB TRENTON -- A "brotherhood" of paramedics dedicated to caring for others tended to one of its own here yesterday.

Paramedics from across southern, central, and eastern Ontario gathered here yesterday to honour the memory of Cpl. Michael Gunter Starker.

The 36-year-old married Calgary paramedic was a reservist medic with Edmonton's 15th Field Ambulance unit. He was killed May 6 in combat in Afghanistan, becoming the 83rd soldier and 84th Canadian killed there since 2002.

As at past repatriations, members of Hastings-Quinte Emergency Medical Services stood at the base and along local roads to provide a quiet show of solidarity.

Joanna Pollock of Calgary Emergency Medical Services worked for about a year and a half with Starker.

"I'm just here to show my support," said Pollock, who had been visiting friends in Ottawa when she learned Starker had been killed.

Yesterday, she attached a large poster of Starker to an ambulance on a Trenton bridge. The poster showed Starker wearing his desert combat fatigues while standing next to an ambulance.

It made for an eerie sight. As Starker's hearse passed by a row of paramedics standing on the road, his image stared out from the poster.

"I think everyone of us would be honoured to see the kind of support that is here today," said Pollock when asked what her colleague would have thought of the EMS presence.

"It's been hard in Calgary, but everyone is really appreciative of the support out here. It's great."

Off-duty paramedics and vehicles from Northumberland County to the Leeds-Grenville area would stand with their vehicles at every major intersection between the base and Highway 401, the so-called Highway of Heroes.

Roger Litwiller of the Hastings-Quinte Paramedic Association has co-ordinated past paramedic presence at repatriations. He said given Starker's trade there was interest from paramedics who aren't based along Highway 401.

"It's always hard to leave someone in your own profession, and unfortunately nationally we lose at least one paramedic a year in line-of-duty deaths. People don't realize that," said Litwiller.

"It's not something as a paramedic you think about happening to yourself, but when it does happen to a brother or a sister it hits home."

Though not involved directly in combat, Canadian Forces medics are "very much in harm's way," said Litwiller.

Four Hastings-Quinte EMS staff blocked traffic along Highway 2 at the base as Starker's hearse began its trip to Toronto, where post-mortem examinations are conducted on all overseas casualties.

Brighton paramedic Troy Ward works in Belleville and said Starker's death has been discussed around the EMS base, but not at great length.

"It's more of an internal thought," he said. "You kind of sit and have your own little moment of bereavement about it, but you talk about it only briefly."

Mark Schjerning, a paramedic from Sydenham north of Kingston, is based in Belleville with H-Q EMS. He was at a provincial EMS conference in Toronto when word of Starker's death was received.

A minute of silence was held, he said, and paramedics began talking about how they might approach the repatriation.

He described the field as being a closely knit "brotherhood."

Plans to attend the repatriation continued until after midnight Thursday night at the local EMS office, he said.

"This gentleman volunteered his time to go and help others, and unfortunately he paid the biggest sacrifice and the ultimate price," said Dave Valdes, a Trenton-based paramedic who lives in Brighton.

He and Schjerning said paramedics are a relatively new emergency service, and are not simply ambulance drivers.

Schjerning said they continue to have a somewhat "unsung" status compared to firefighters and police, but that their public profile is now starting to increase.

"You do the job because you enjoy it," added Ward.