Yeah, twelve. Van full of kids with their parents breaks down on the service road. They call their friends, who also happen to be carrying a station wagon full of kids, to come jump them. Cars are facing head on to jump the battery of the van when some drunken asshole swerves off the road, hits the van, which in turn runs into the station wagon. Naturally, this all goes down in BFE surrounding county, who has a total of three ambulances. What do they do? They go full ambulance clown car, pack like, three patients per truck, and book it on down to Hood Hospital. We knew they were all coming- my patients were all waiting on disposition, so me and my medic buddy just went out in the bay with stretchers and unloaded the patients from the back of the ambulance. We look up to see that a little shelf on the ceiling where they store extra backboards actually has one of the kids on it, back boarded and c-collared. Holy crap, good thing he was stable.
Most of the injuries were pretty minor, if not non-existent, so we parked all of them along the hall, took vitals, and did about a two minute triage- okay, were you in the car or the van? Do you remember everything that happened? Do you hurt anywhere? Do you have any medical problems? Are you allergic to anything? Okay, next. The worst of all the injuries ended up being a little school age boy with a fib fracture, who was the biggest badass of all. He was all polite and yes ma'am to everything we said, and rated his pain at like 4, was more worried about whether his siblings were all doing okay.
It ended up being kind of a funny story and almost like a little mock disaster drill, but it could have been so much worse. Don't drink and drive, kids.
I never miss opportunities like this to put on my paranoid mom hat.
ReplyDeleteIf your car breaks down on the road, GET AWAY FROM IT. Go stand in the ditch. I don't care if it's raining and the ditch is infested with fire ants. I don't care if it's hurricane-ing and the ditch is infested with rabid jackelopes. I don't care if the roadside assistance truck has arrived and they're working on the car. DO NOT STAND NEAR A CAR BY THE SIDE OF THE ROAD.
If you absolutely must be near your car (because, for instance, your ass is made of metal and has been welded to the seat), be *in* it, with the seatbelt ON and the doors locked.
A disabled car by the road is like a beacon flashing "hit me hit me hit me" to every drunk in viewing distance. Such a dumb way to be injured (or die).
/end tirade
That bit about the four-year-old being badass just made my day!
ReplyDeleteDrinking and driving always seems to me to be one of the most selfish crimes there is. It seems like the drunk driver has this attitude of I don't care if it's illegal it's a matter of can I get away with it, do it and not get caught.
ReplyDeleteGlad that everyone was mostly ok. I've seen many where that wasn't the case.
This. There is no excuse for drunk driving save for selfishness. Which isn't an excuse. :-(
DeleteArzt4empfaenger
"They go full ambulance clown car" oh my GAWD you are so hilarious. I almost lost my drink out of my nose reading that! This is why I love your blog because you're so effing funny.
ReplyDeleteHoly heart-in-throat! I was expecting this story to turn out way, WAY worse.
ReplyDeleteSo what about the drunk? Obviously s/he wasn't hurt, because the drunks almost never are, but was it a known-to-cops drunk? A kid?