Shit Magnets...

Anyone who has ever spent any time in EMS will know exactly what I'm talking about. Sometimes they're referred to as a black cloud, but in NJ we always called em shit magnets. You get into an ambulance with them, and you get the feeling of dread in the pit of your stomach. You just KNOW that you're going to be stuck on run, after run, after run.

Maybe you should have packed a lunch?!?!?! (We gave one of the local firefighters a packed lunch after he took 1 run with one of our EMTs. I think it was like 6 runs later (after passing the firehouse multiple times with the guys waving and laughing at him) that he finally managed to get out of the ambulance. (And marathon runs like that will take it out of you in the worst way.)

Anyway, a couple of years into my career as a volunteer EMT in northern NJ, we're covering the local fair. It's evening (we were cooking hamburgers and hotdogs for dinner [fair food is good, but gets expensive when you live at the place for more than a week.]) We just happened to overhear one of "our" fire departments doing a self-dispatch from the firehouse (apparently the dispatch tower was down?) for an MVA in our primary. The crew on duty that evening jumped in one of the ambulances and put themselves in service to the call. It wasn't long after they started responding that the updates started coming in from the scene.

"We're going to need another ambulance, multiple patients to be transported." Was radioed from the firefighters on scene to headquarters.

A second crew was hastily put together and put themselves in service to the accident scene.

Seconds later: "Dispatch, get me extrication for a door pop." (Our squad in the area was running rescue at the time [and they still should be...in my humble opinion]) We had a rescue guy at the fair with us, but I was as close as they could get for a second rescue guy (and I know just enough about rescue to get myself in trouble.) I got to ride shotgun to the job.

We pull up on scene and we're directed to the vehicle that has a door that needs-a-poppin. Only the door isn't jammed, and we managed to get it open with handtools only. Local fire chief and I bent that door so far back it was junk by the time we were done with it.

We end up using the rescue truck as a supply box, and putting our patient on a backboard. We load her into one of the ambulances on scene, and I get directed to maintain patient contact. OK, this I can do. Shortly, a second EMT with a second patient is put into the bus with me, and the Shit Magnet (mentioned in the first paragraph) gets behind the drivers seat.

We're the first crew to leave the accident scene, leaving the other patients in the more then capable hands of the other 2 ambulance crews on scene (we ended up with 4 vehicles on location). On the way to the ER, patients are stable, no major complaints (as far as I remember anyway). We're coming down the hill into the town were the ER is located, I've called ahead and given a report, when one of the dispatchers gets on the radio and tells SM to "go home." (this was a fairly regular occurance for us...). I don't remember the rest of the conversation, but I did chime in by sticking my head through into the cab of the bus and saying. "SM, I love you to death, but if I get stuck in this damned ambulance with you for the rest of the night, I'm gonna be pissed!"

We finish the transport, and manage to restock our ambulance that had been stripped of backboards and other important equipment. We manage to leave the ER will a fully equipped truck, so we're ready to go on the next job. We head back to the fair, stopping off at Dunkin Donuts on the way.

We turn ONTO the access road for the fairgrounds, and SM turns to me (I'm still in the back) and says, "See, we made it back, no problem."

Immediately, as if God is laughing at us:

"Dispatch from [the fair], start us a CAD, we have reports of CPR in progress on the fairgrounds.

I groan, look at SM in the mirror and say "GREAT, thanks, love you too. Oh well, ask 'em where we need to take this bad boy."

Ended up treating the CPR, and saving his life. Awesome feelings got better a year later, when the patient walked into the first aid station to THANK us for saving his life. He was back to dance the next year!

That was an awesome feeling!