# Funniest Story Your Instructor Ever Told You



## GhostEMT627 (Jun 8, 2010)

Ok, I'm new to the forum and I apologize if this is already a subject. 
My instructor, now director of the ER at one of the hospitlas here in Long Beach, told us a story that had a few of us in tears from laughing so hard. 
Apparently while he was working as a volunteer, he made friends with a few of the nurses  One of the nurses decided it was time to take a smoke break.

 I don't know about any of you but I have the habit of always looking in people's rooms while I walk by. Its a bad habit I know, but my instructor has the same problem.

Anyways, he was walking down the hall with a nurse and he looked in a room and stopped. He walked into the room and yelled for his nurse friend. She came flying in behind him and he yelled at her to go get help. He started CPR and mouth to mouth. He had been at it for about a minute he said when the charge nurse came in and asked him, "What the $%#$ are you doing?" "I'm trying to save this woman's life!" The charge nurse kind of gave him a funny look and he yelled back, "Help me!" She looked at the woman and then back at him, "She has been dead for an hour." My instructor said that he jumped off and threw up everywhere. 

His facial expression was priceless while he was telling us this but I can't even imagine... 

Had to share. Apologies again if this is already a subject somewhere.


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## Major.Huff (Jun 17, 2010)

Oh jeez, that is pretty insane. I think I could have had the same response. No BVM?

One of my instructors from class is a flight paramedic. This was during the winter, so he was telling us how a week ago a patient was snowboarding and took a nasty tumble down the hill. Well his helicopter was dispatched and after picking up the patient, he quickly discovered that prior to this wreck the patient ate a massive amount of food, because it was ALL over the cabin. 
Once they arrived at the hospital and filled out the paper work, they were going to restock and remembered.. Hey. He puked, and it's about 10 degrees out. They had to chip the vomit off the windows, & floor! Ugh. 

We were laughing so hard. Much respect for him.


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## MTEMTB (Jun 23, 2010)

My instructor told us about her first CPR pt. She said when she was taught CPR they did not tell them the pt could vomit.
She was a motorcycle crash. Guy had eaten beer and pizza just before the wreck. She was doing the mouth to mouth and the pt vomited right into her mouth.
She said she turned and vomited too, cleared his airway and continued, says she can still taste that beer and pizza every once in awhile.


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## Sasha (Jun 23, 2010)

What the heck is with all the doing mouth to mouth? I will never do mouth to mouth unless it's a family member that I know is clean, and even then, it's not a given. No, wont even do mouth to mouth on babies. 

Funniest story my instructor ever told me is that EMTs were well paid and respected. Hahahaha.


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## LucidResq (Jun 23, 2010)

I could give you all the particulars but this sums it up pretty well: baby unexpectedly delivered into mom's spandex pants while en route to hospital.


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## MTEMTB (Jun 23, 2010)

Sasha try this happened like 30 years ago.


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## adamjh3 (Jun 27, 2010)

Sasha said:


> Funniest story my instructor ever told me is that EMTs were well paid and respected. Hahahaha.



Well, the little kids _do_ give us funny looks when we're trying to eat...


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## lightsandsirens5 (Jun 27, 2010)

My instructor told several epinephrine stories that stuck with me.

First story: Teenage kid gets stung (or eats something or gets into something he shouldn't or whatever) and the mom breaks out the epi-pen. Except she thought it was for *her* to take to keep her calm when her son had a reaction. Needless to say when EMS finally arrived (my instructor was one of the crewmembers) they had one pt in severe resp. distress and one wired pt probably on the verge of v-tach. Ended up transporting both of them.

Second story: Trainee attempting to give epi via epi-pen places flat end on pts thigh and presses black button with his thumb. Apparently the needle got stuck into the bone, essentiall gving him IO epi (albeit in the thumb)

And of course I must add this one. Even though it is un-eventful. Seems like my instructor was an epinephrine mishap magnet. On scene he managed to stop a pt from giving himself his own epi-pen _in the side of his neck._ :wacko: That one could have been nasty. Potentially much worse than the first two.


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## usafmedic45 (Jun 27, 2010)

> First story: Teenage kid gets stung (or eats something or gets into something he shouldn't or whatever) and the mom breaks out the epi-pen. Except she thought it was for her to take to keep her calm when her son had a reaction. Needless to say when EMS finally arrived (my instructor was one of the crewmembers) they had one pt in severe resp. distress and one wired pt probably on the verge of v-tach. Ended up transporting both of them.



Seen that as well, except it was the patient's aunt in my case.  She seemed intrigued when I informed her that you can get diazepam ("mother's little helper" per the Rolling Stones) in autoinjector form.  



> Second story: Trainee attempting to give epi via epi-pen places flat end on pts thigh and presses black button with his thumb. Apparently the needle got stuck into the bone, essentiall gving him IO epi (albeit in the thumb)



Seen that too, only in my case the moron in question was a nurse demonstrating the "proper use" of the Epi-Pen to a patient and her parents.


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## LondonMedic (Jun 27, 2010)

The funiest story I ever heard from a senior involves a funeral, some close friends, a crate of lager and gratuitous nudity.


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## LucidResq (Jun 27, 2010)

usafmedic45 said:


> Seen that too, only in my case the moron in question was a nurse demonstrating the "proper use" of the Epi-Pen to a patient and her parents.



One of my paramedic instructors was demonstrating with what he thought was a trainer. One of my fellow students said "if that's a trainer, why does it have an expiration date?" He shrugged the kid off and proceeded... nope... it was definitely real and he definitely had it backwards. Needle was bent at a 90 degree angle in his thumb. The other instructors tried to talk him in to going to the ER (out of concern for his thumb more than anything) but he refused. Can't say I blame him.


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## Sasha (Jun 27, 2010)

LucidResq said:


> One of my paramedic instructors was demonstrating with what he thought was a trainer. One of my fellow students said "if that's a trainer, why does it have an expiration date?" He shrugged the kid off and proceeded... nope... it was definitely real and he definitely had it backwards. Needle was bent at a 90 degree angle in his thumb. The other instructors tried to talk him in to going to the ER (out of concern for his thumb more than anything) but he refused. Can't say I blame him.



What is it with people and epi-pens? One of my EMT instructors thought she was using a trainer, too, and slammed it into her thigh, not only was it a real epi pen, but it was like years expired.


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## lightsandsirens5 (Jun 27, 2010)

Sasha said:


> What is it with people and epi-pens?



Ya I know! I thought the idea behind the whole "pen" thing (besides being a tremendous money maker) was so it was idiot proof.


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## LondonMedic (Jun 27, 2010)

Sasha said:


> What is it with people and epi-pens?


I've heard of plenty of incidents, surely there's a big, fixable, safety issue here.


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## jjesusfreak01 (Jun 27, 2010)

LondonMedic said:


> I've heard of plenty of incidents, surely there's a big, fixable, safety issue here.



Well, they do put the correct instructions on the side of the pen. It says jab black tip into outer thigh. You can mistake black for clear unless you are blind.

As they say, you can't fix stupid.


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## usafmedic45 (Jun 27, 2010)

In the ongoing struggle between engineers trying to make things idiot proof and human breeding practices making bigger idiots, so far the latter is winning hands down. 



> I've heard of plenty of incidents, surely there's a big, fixable, safety issue here



Not really...at least not without doing the intelligence equivalent of ethnic cleansing on the population at large.  Even as an injury prevention researcher (my non-clinical job), I have to reiterate:



> As they say, you can't fix stupid.


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## Lt.Col.Warren (Jun 30, 2010)

This one is great. Instructor told me that he was at the station when he got a call ordering him to report the the hospital Code 3 (they had no patient). They get in the Rescue and rush to the ER. When they get there, a guy comes running out shouting, "Bring your ring cutter!" It turns out that some guy was having trouble with his wife and while he was passed out the night before, she had slipped a closed wrench over his you know what. Problem is that the way the wrench was, the viens were closed off, but the arteries were not and it was blowing up. In the end it took a matanience crew and several hack-saws to get it off. As a fellow male all I could say was OW!


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## wijjiam (Jul 2, 2010)

LucidResq said:


> One of my paramedic instructors was demonstrating with what he thought was a trainer. One of my fellow students said "if that's a trainer, why does it have an expiration date?" He shrugged the kid off and proceeded... nope... it was definitely real and he definitely had it backwards. Needle was bent at a 90 degree angle in his thumb. The other instructors tried to talk him in to going to the ER (out of concern for his thumb more than anything) but he refused. Can't say I blame him.



epinephrine constricts the blood vessels. now doesent that meen (if you fill your thumb whith epinephrine.) cant it potentaly fall off.


my funniest instruter storry she is working on a pt. he can her god. he is bing uncoopurtive to say the least. now this is back in the day when the cars had intercoms. she is the teck. the driver goes over the intercom "THIS IS GOD NOW COOPURATE WHITH HER AND BE A GOOD BOY"


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## mar7967 (Jul 2, 2010)

wijjiam said:


> epinephrine constricts the blood vessels. now doesent that meen (if you fill your thumb whith epinephrine.) cant it potentaly fall off.



Kinda...If you accidentally stick your thumb (or any finger for that matter) with an epi-pen, it will most likely get nice and cool, and pale. If you don't get some sort of treatment, you can probably lose your finger. I don't think it would fall off, but it would probably have to be amputated.


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## lampnyter (Jul 3, 2010)

not really a story but, in my EMT class we had quizzes every class and after the first few quizzes more than half the class failed so our intstructor says, "i was going to give you a quiz today but according to my therapist your bad grades has put me into chronic depression so we will not be having any quizzes for a while..."


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## LucidResq (Jul 4, 2010)

wijjiam said:


> epinephrine constricts the blood vessels. now doesent that meen (if you fill your thumb whith epinephrine.) cant it potentaly fall off.



Yes and that is why the other medics wanted him to go in, not because of the systemic effects. Not necessarily going to fall off but as mentioned epi is a good vasoconstrictor and could potentially lead to enough blood supply being cut from the thumb to cause permanent damage.


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## reaper (Jul 4, 2010)

In theory, yes. In reality, not likely.

I have ran on countless Pt's who's spouses or family members have stuck their thumbs, while trying to give an Epi pen. They bounce around, hearts racing for a while. A few had complications from cardiac problems. Have never seen one have any problem with vasoconstriction in the blood supply to thumb.


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## jjesusfreak01 (Jul 4, 2010)

If you are really worried, i'll bet leaches will do wonders...


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## Joe (Jul 4, 2010)

One of the best stories I have ever heard. My inst knew a flight medic who had a pt with hypoglycemia who had passed out during the flight to the er. Keep in mind this was about 10 years ago ( if I remember right) so this medic for some reason does not have what he needs to correct the problem, but he has a lunch. The next part involves a party sized snickers bar and the pt's butthole. PT RECOVERED and gained concioisness as they landed at er! Flight medic was terminated. By far the funniest story I have ever heard from my instructor


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## lampnyter (Jul 4, 2010)

Joe said:


> One of the best stories I have ever heard. My inst knew a flight medic who had a pt with hypoglycemia who had passed out during the flight to the er. Keep in mind this was about 10 years ago ( if I remember right) so this medic for some reason does not have what he needs to correct the problem, but he has a lunch. The next part involves a party sized snickers bar and the pt's butthole. PT RECOVERED and gained concioisness as they landed at er! Flight medic was terminated. By far the funniest story I have ever heard from my instructor



and how big was that lawsuit? lol. thats sick man.


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## Joe (Jul 4, 2010)

lampnyter said:


> and how big was that lawsuit? lol. thats sick man.



luckily it was before people sued for everything. and on the plus side, i guess it saved his life...


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## lampnyter (Jul 4, 2010)

wait how did it save his life??


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## Joe (Jul 5, 2010)

I don't know how, I guess it would have fixed it's self after long enough. If it were me I'd use that as justification hahaha


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## Captn' Tuddle (Jul 6, 2010)

While we're on this topic:
My instructor is called to a residence where she finds a man laying face-down in the front yard, soaking wet, wearing nothing but his socks and the mop head sticking out of his rear. Upon closer examination of the pt she finds a bump by his shoulder which she determines is the handle of the mop. She never did find out how it got there...


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## EMTfromSanJac (Jul 10, 2010)

He told us about a dude that tied fishing line around his you know what to try and keep it up, and well I am sure you can imagine the details of the story. He ended up losing his member.


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## lightsandsirens5 (Jul 29, 2010)

Captn' Tuddle said:


> While we're on this topic:
> My instructor is called to a residence where she finds a man laying face-down in the front yard, soaking wet, wearing nothing but his socks and the mop head sticking out of his rear. Upon closer examination of the pt she finds a bump by his shoulder which she determines is the handle of the mop. She never did find out how it got there...


 
That is not funny......I hope he was dead and not just lying there, skwered. Poor guy......


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## Sassafras (Aug 6, 2010)

My instructor is dispatched for a "possible stabbing".  They arrive on scene, she turns around to get the jump bag and hears "(Her name)".  She's struggeling with the jump bag and yanking at it and her partner repeats "(her name) NOW!" turns around and sees a guy walking out of the building COVERED in blood.  All over his chest, head, going down his pants.  "POSSIBLE stabbing?" she asks and goes rushing over to start the assesment.  There is blood everywhere and the story she tells leads us to believe liters of blood are missing from his body, but he's yelling "Muthuh F*$*uhs I'm gonna kill em! I'm gonna kill em.  Get me stitches so I can get back here and beat the living S$*& out of them!" he's agitated obviously, they calm him down enough to look around and keep asking "where's he bleeding from?" blood congealing at this point and while telling us never to poke at blood to see how deep a wound is, procedes to start poking trying to find where this dude is bleeding from. "Sir what happened?"  

"They tried to kill me with a hatchet!"
"A hatchet?"
"yES A hatchet!"

*send cop in after said hatchet.
*cop returns no hatchet
Turns out it was a chefs knif or meat cleaver, but kitchen knife none the less and not a hatchet.

Finally exasperated over not being able to find where all this blood is coming from she takes her hand and while telling us the tale says "NEVER do this by the way" and wipes all the jello blood off his chest...no wound ANYWHERE.  

WTF they think.

Keep looking, back to the matted nasty bloody head and FINALLY they find it.  A less than 2 inch lac. on his head pouring blood out faster than they can blink.  Finally get the dude still enough to bandage and off to the hospital they go where he continued to swear he was getting a coupluh stitches and going back out there to kill the mo foes that tried to kill him with a hatchet.  

They were kinda nervous about the next call they'd receive that night.


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## Martyn (Aug 8, 2010)

lightsandsirens5 said:


> Ya I know! I thought the idea behind the whole "pen" thing (besides being a tremendous money maker) was so it was idiot proof.




Idiot proof, yeah...medic/instructor proof, no


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## MoonachieFirstAid&Rescue (Aug 9, 2010)

LucidResq said:


> One of my paramedic instructors was demonstrating with what he thought was a trainer. One of my fellow students said "if that's a trainer, why does it have an expiration date?" He shrugged the kid off and proceeded... nope... it was definitely real and he definitely had it backwards. Needle was bent at a 90 degree angle in his thumb. The other instructors tried to talk him in to going to the ER (out of concern for his thumb more than anything) but he refused. Can't say I blame him.



Almost all of the epi-pens I used in EMT were real but they were from a batch that was recalled years ago because the factory forgot to put needles in them.


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## MrBrown (Aug 9, 2010)

I heard of one lady who used an adrenaline autoinjector on herself rather than the kid she meant it for because whe positioned it around the wrong way.

Apparently she ended up with a run or two of VT


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## esmcdowell (Aug 12, 2010)

when my B instructor was a Fire recruit, his engine was enroute to an MVC and dispatch said someone was "ejaculated" from the vehicle, Engine Captain copied pt "ejaculated", captain got yelled at for it later though...


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## probiejoe (Oct 4, 2010)

*amputation*

well my instructors were great, and every now and again they would bless us w/ a great story... one of those that had us hanging to every word... here is the best one. we live out in texas, so roughnecking is a big deal here (working on oil rigs)

these roughneckers were setting up for a new drill site, and one of the guys pushes a pipe through, and his arm gets caught up in it, and pulls that sucker right in. his coworker thinking on his feet, grabbed the guys arm, threw it in the cooler in the back of the company truck, and high tailed it to the emergency room. these guys were a few miles out of town, called the er en route, and they were supposed to meet up with a box, but took some odd route and made it to the er first. the coworker helps his buddy into the emergency room, leaving his truck parked across the street from the ambulance entrance. some 'hoodlums' were walking by the hospital, saw a company truck unattended, saw the cooler and thought to themselved 'alright, free beer' this is a big cooler, so each guy grabs one end of the cooler and walk down the street with it. as they're getting the guy in the er stable, they ask his friend 'where's his arm'? the guy runs out to his truck, then runs back in, and said that someone took the cooler... they called the pd, and the police caught up with the 'hoodlums' a few blocks away, they were taken into custody and charged with "armed robbery"


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## JJR512 (Oct 4, 2010)

jjesusfreak01 said:


> As they say, you can't fix stupid.



And trying to fix it actually makes it worse. Natural selection will eventually fix the problem by itself, but trying to help stupid people just gives them more opportunity to spread stupidity into the world.


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## EMT204 (Nov 27, 2010)

*ketchup bottle*

well, we all remember the science lab where the hard boiled egg was put on an empty glass bottle of heinz ketchup right? well my instructor told my class a story about a gentleman and his lady friend getting a little adventerous lets just say... well they felt it would be pleasurable to light a match put it in the bottle and the gentleman put one of his testicles on top of the bottle and you can imagine what happened next, with a luagh our adventerous couple got a nice ride to the hospital...


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## sbemt4596 (Dec 1, 2010)

One of my Basic instructors told us a story from back in his early days of EMS some 20 years ago. They are dispatched to a shooting and his partner parked the rig right in front of the address (a run-down, drug infested motel), PD is on scene but the scene is not secure, and shots are still being fired. My instructor approaches one of the officers on scene, a friend, and asks where they patient(s) is? The officer, plastered against the wall and gun in hand, points around the corner to the top of the stairs where they can see one person. The officer tells my instructor to run up and get the patient and he would cover him, my instructor refused - silently questioning the officer's marksmanship skills. But after a half-hour on scene he relents, runs up grabs the patient and drags him down the stairs by his feet with the patient's head hitting EVERY step on the way down. Good thing the patient was already dead!


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## sbemt4596 (Dec 1, 2010)

Another one from the same instructor, we'll call him Fred*. This also happened some 20-odd years ago. He was partnered with our lead instructor, Bob*, that day when they were called to a residence for an unknown medical. No one answered but they could hear a commotion in the backyard so they went to check it out. Fred was a little ahead and as they rounded the corner of the house Fred's head was met by a 2-by-4. Fred was out cold but the tape recorder in his pocket was still recording. So Bob was left alone to tend to the original pt and now also Fred. The recording went as follows:

To Fred "Fred, Fred you ok man?"
To original pt. "Ma'am my name is Bob I'm with the Mom-n-Pop Squad. What seems to be the problem?"
To Fred "Fred, Fred you ok? Fred wake-up man?" 
To original pt "Yes Ma'am, I am listening to you."
To Fred "Fred you ok? You ok Fred?"

This went on until another unit arrived. 

He told us this story to let us know that in the event that your partner goes down, s/he takes priority over the original pt and if you are alone than it's perfectly ok to just focus on your partner!

* names have been changed to protect the innocent ... well actually only me really!


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## ptemt (Dec 1, 2010)

I had a medic school instructer relate a story of running on a FF drunk.  The medic would place a NC on the pt, hand him the other end of the cannula, and instruct him to blow into it.


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## Minnick27 (Dec 1, 2010)

Not an instructor story, but one from my EMT class. We were all sharing war stories and this one woman who was an EMT and was taking the class as a refresher was telling us about this unruly pt she had a year or so before. She's going into great detail about everything this gentleman is yelling. Knowing her local I raised my hand and asked if the pt had also yelled this and that and was giving examples. She said yeah, he was saying everything I said. Someone commented I must have had a similar pt. I said one more question, was this at such and such an address? And she said yes. It turns out it wast grandfather she had taken.  Had he still been alive he wouldve been very proud


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## HasTy (Dec 1, 2010)

We were doing our trauma module during my basic class and my instructor relayed a call that I had been on with him during my ride along: We were coming along back on the freeway at a pretty decent pace when the rig shook and I heard a crotch rocket pass us. The guy had to have been doing 100 well he is trying to shift and his boot is stuck so he reaches down to try and shift again and just eats it...wouldn't have been funny except that when we caught up with him and started to backboard him and such he looks up at my preceptor and says....I thought I already divorced you.


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## ZombieEMT (Dec 8, 2010)

I remember a story one of my instructors told me during training from back when he was working as a dispatcher. He was just getting off his shift when he heard across the room, and ambulance request an additional bus. He ran to the mic and his immediate response was, is that your local school district or NJ transit. Apparently it was a pet peeve of his that an ambulance is called a bus every once in a while since a bus can be used as an actual resource in MCIs.


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## Bullets (Dec 8, 2010)

My instructor and his partner were driving back to HQ when they observed a motorist enjoying a refreshing adult beverage while operating a motor vehicle. They radioed it in to Comms, who said a Radio car was 5 minutes out running code 3. The guy started swerving so they hit the lights, got on the loud speaker and pulled the guy over. They conducted a FELONY stop with the ambulance, and by the time PD arrived they had the driver out, doing a field sobriety test, with his LR&I on hand. cops thought it was hilarious, EMS supervisor didnt


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## jjesusfreak01 (Dec 8, 2010)

Bullets said:


> My instructor and his partner were driving back to HQ when they observed a motorist enjoying a refreshing adult beverage while operating a motor vehicle. They radioed it in to Comms, who said a Radio car was 5 minutes out running code 3. The guy started swerving so they hit the lights, got on the loud speaker and pulled the guy over. They conducted a FELONY stop with the ambulance, and by the time PD arrived they had the driver out, doing a field sobriety test, with his LR&I on hand. cops thought it was hilarious, EMS supervisor didnt



Simple fix here. Call it in to dispatch, get a cop to come out, and follow them until the traffic stop is made. You will be there in case they do get into an accident, but aren't putting yourself in extreme danger or going outside your scope.


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## Bullets (Dec 8, 2010)

jjesusfreak01 said:


> Simple fix here. Call it in to dispatch, get a cop to come out, and follow them until the traffic stop is made. You will be there in case they do get into an accident, but aren't putting yourself in extreme danger or going outside your scope.



oh, no doubt they were stupid, but it was the meaner leaner days of EMS and Law Enforcement, so no one really cared or thought twice about it


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## Silver_Star (Dec 9, 2010)

jjesusfreak01 said:


> Simple fix here. Call it in to dispatch, get a cop to come out, and follow them until the traffic stop is made. You will be there in case they do get into an accident, but aren't putting yourself in extreme danger or going outside your scope.



that is an option, but i think what the crew did was slightly admirable since the guy was beginning to swerve. had they not pulled him over, the guy could have very well killed someone.


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## reaper (Dec 10, 2010)

Till the drunk gets out and puts a bullet in their chest!


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