Approximately 75 hospital staff members, administration and local dignitaries gathered in the chilly morning air Oct. 12 to celebrate the beginning of the Whidbey General Hospital expansion project.

It is being paid for with a bond passed by voters in 2013. The groundbreaking ceremony marked the start of a new parking area northeast of the hospital. It will accommodate cars currently parking where the wing is to be built, on the hospital’s south side. The helipad in front of the hospital will be removed and a new one built. A phalanx of gold-painted shovels leaned against a chain-link fence surrounding the construction site. First high-ranking guests, then anyone in the crowd, were invited to shovel a spadeful of dirt from one part of a pile to another.