# What do you call an ambulance?



## Pittsburgh Proud (Mar 18, 2008)

Thought it might be fun or different to hear all the names you might call an ambulance, not "truck" or "bus" but slang type of terms like "band aid box" or something along those lines.


----------



## ErinCooley (Mar 18, 2008)

Got nuttin... its a truck or if its one of those mini van-type things its usually the "clown car"


----------



## JPINFV (Mar 18, 2008)

We generally call it either a unit or an ambulance in normal discourse. I never had anyone call it a truck or, god forbid, bus.


----------



## firecoins (Mar 18, 2008)

everyone here refers to it as a the bus.  Cops often refer to it as a bus saying "Rush the bus" in emergencies.  TV's Law and Order often reflects this.

I call it a taxi.  It is.


----------



## seanm028 (Mar 19, 2008)

Here, we call them rescues or ambos.


----------



## colafdp (Mar 19, 2008)

we usually call it a unit, or ambulance here too


----------



## ffemt8978 (Mar 19, 2008)

Rig or bus is the usual terms around here.


----------



## EMTBandit (Mar 19, 2008)

Rig or Bus. Or when we see the van ambulance, it's a "vanbulance".


----------



## Grady_emt (Mar 19, 2008)

Buggy, Wagon, Unit, Truck, basically anything but rescue and ambulance.

When Fire or PD is asking for us, they just refer to the ambulance as Grady.  ie: "2104 radio rush Grady person shot in the chest"..."Engine 7 radio: is Grady enroute and can I get an ETA?"


----------



## Pittsburgh Proud (Mar 19, 2008)

JPINFV said:


> We generally call it either a unit or an ambulance in normal discourse. I never had anyone call it a truck or, god forbid, bus.



I've Been around EMS in this area for 24 years and for some reason we have always call it a "truck". All I can figure is it started when the ambulances still had pick up truck front ends on them.


----------



## Jon (Mar 19, 2008)

When I was down in Louisiana with my company after Katrina, the manager running the deployment came up with the acronym STRAUB (Squad, Truck, Rig, Ambulance, Unit Bus) to refer to the vehicles as... because the various regional phrases were confusing.

Here's the list of various regional names:
Ambulance
Medic
Squad
Truck
Rig
Car
Bus
Unit


----------



## Ridryder911 (Mar 19, 2008)

You call it a bus here, they presume you work for a school. Never heard of that until I seen it on the EMS forums. We call then units, or rigs, truck in slang. 


R/R 911


----------



## Jon (Mar 19, 2008)

Ridryder911 said:


> You call it a bus here, they presume you work for a school...



"Bus" seems to be a FDNY thing... after Third Watch became popular, the term started to be used in this area. The county's radio room supervisor sent a memo to every Fire/EMS department that said that you needed to call a BLS ambulance an ambulance, an ALS ambulance a MICU, a chase car medic a medic, and if you asked for a bus, you'd be asked "how many passengers" and if you had a preference for transportation vendor.

My list was a rather comprehensive list of national phrases.


----------



## MedicPrincess (Mar 19, 2008)

Truck.   Sometimes Unit.  The county I used to work for has BLS Vanbulances.


----------



## KEVD18 (Mar 19, 2008)

mainly sh!tbox, pos, granny getter, whambulance


----------



## eggshen (Mar 19, 2008)

In Denver "Bus" is the accepted term.

Egg


----------



## Pittsburgh Proud (Mar 19, 2008)

KEVD18 said:


> mainly sh!tbox, pos, granny getter, whambulance



LMAO.....


----------



## Pittsburgh Proud (Mar 19, 2008)

Jon said:


> "Bus" seems to be a FDNY thing... after Third Watch became popular, the term started to be used in this area. The county's radio room supervisor sent a memo to every Fire/EMS department that said that you needed to call a BLS ambulance an ambulance, an ALS ambulance a MICU, a chase car medic a medic, and if you asked for a bus, you'd be asked "how many passengers" and if you had a preference for transportation vendor.
> 
> My list was a rather comprehensive list of national phrases.



A lot us "Bus" around here, my term has always been "truck" I agree Ny started that one or rather TV did.B)


----------



## Onceamedic (Mar 19, 2008)

we say rig  ...  I say amblance...   at work we refer to 10 or 20, etc.  (the number of the rig) as in Get 40 and let's go.


----------



## Outbac1 (Mar 19, 2008)

Here its an ambulance, truck or rig. It is not a bus.

   I worked in the bus business for 16 years,(parts, service, sales). I have driven all types of them, north, south, east, and west and both sides of the border. I can catagorically say an ambulance is NOT a bus.


----------



## KEVD18 (Mar 19, 2008)

Outbac1 said:


> Here its an ambulance, truck or rig. It is not a bus.
> 
> I worked in the bus business for 16 years,(parts, service, sales). I have driven all types of them, north, south, east, and west and both sides of the border. I can catagorically say an ambulance is NOT a bus.



tell that to fdny


----------



## mikie (Mar 19, 2008)

Friends/Family: Ambulance
Around here/familiar people: rig, ambulance
work: seventy-five (75)
at the hospital: one union thirty nine (1U39)


----------



## Pittsburgh Proud (Mar 19, 2008)

KEVD18 said:


> tell that to fdny



Aaaaahhhh They all cruse around in the "Band Aid Boxes"...lol


----------



## eggshen (Mar 20, 2008)

I find it odd that some seem to get a touch bitter about calling it a "bus". It's just colloquialism....nothing more. Personally, I think "ambo" sounds a bit "douchy". So there you have it.

Egg


----------



## dataxpress (Mar 20, 2008)

eggshen said:


> I find it odd that some seem to get a touch bitter about calling it a "bus". It's just colloquialism....nothing more. Personally, I think "ambo" sounds a bit "douchy". So there you have it.
> 
> Egg



"Douchy"?  Ambo is a perfectly acceptable way of shortening the word.

Let's consider this from a purely linguistic view:

Our original word is "Ambulance".  We want to shorten it to a one- or two-syllable word.

1) We could simply cut off half of the word, and go with "Ambu".  However, American-English generally doesn't like words ending with "u", not to mention that the "bu" as in am*bu*lance has an uncharacteristic sound.  Am-bew? 

2) We could shorten it to one syllable, and go with "Amb".  Amb, like as in Lamb.  However, this doesn't 'flow' very well with other sentences ("is the amb here yet?") because you have to stress the "amb". Spoken English is generally Iambic in pattern, and this breaks that.

3) We could go for a longer alternative (that's what she said) and try something like "Ambul", but this suffers still from the "bu" mentioned in (1) except that it sounds more like "Bueller." Bueller, Bueller, Bueller.

I can understand that you might not like "Ambo" because the original word isn't "Ambolance", but when you consider the alternatives for shortening it, it is the lesser of evils.

Why, however, do you think it is "douchy"?  Ambo, as we all can tell, is a part of the word R*ambo*, and as we all should know, Rambo is a badass.  That, alone, makes Ambo the superior term.

Oh, and Hi, EMTLife.  I'll post an introduction thread soon.


----------



## seanm028 (Mar 20, 2008)

dataxpress said:


> "Douchy"?  Ambo is a perfectly acceptable way of shortening the word.
> 
> Let's consider this from a purely linguistic view:
> 
> ...



Damn, someone got told.  Welcome to the boards.


----------



## EMT815 (Mar 20, 2008)

I usually call it a rig. Sometimes I will refer to them by their numbers. There is this one guy that I know who if retired FDNY EMS and he always refers to them as buses so I think your right who ever said that they thought that bus was a FDNY thing.


----------



## JPINFV (Mar 20, 2008)

dataxpress said:


> 1) We could simply cut off half of the word, and go with "Ambu".  However, American-English generally doesn't like words ending with "u", not to mention that the "bu" as in am*bu*lance has an uncharacteristic sound.  Am-bew?



Besides, "Ambu" has already been taken for a brand of BVMs. Hence the term, Ambu Bag.


----------



## Jon (Mar 20, 2008)

I knew I had it somewhere at home.. the morning bulletin joke during Katrina was that the vehicle was a "*STRAUB*": *S*quad, *T*ruck, *R*ig, *A*mbulance, *U*nit, *B*us.... and the northerners still called them "Cars".

Jon


----------



## enjoynz (Mar 20, 2008)

eggshen said:


> I find it odd that some seem to get a touch bitter about calling it a "bus". It's just colloquialism....nothing more. Personally, I think "ambo" sounds a bit "douchy". So there you have it.
> 
> Egg



Here we are called 'ambo's' (Ambulance Officers), not the ambulance or truck(mind you, our trucks are more vans than trucks)!
As far as the 'bus' thing goes. Does it count if you use a bus to transport the walking wounded from a bus accident to a local hall for further observation and checks? Which is something that was done here in NZ a year ago, when they ended up with 40 odd students in a bus MVA. LOL.

Cheers Enjoynz


----------



## bonedog (Mar 20, 2008)

Mostly use "car" here, dates back to the bonneville's and caddy's.

Unit  is also prevalent.


----------



## Pittsburgh Proud (Mar 20, 2008)

bonedog said:


> Mostly use "car" here, dates back to the bonneville's and caddy's.
> 
> Unit  is also prevalent.



About 24 years ago as I was entering the whole EMS world we had a "back-line" caddy but I can honestly say I don't think I ever heard it called a car but that time was short lived so It might very well have been.


----------



## emtangie850 (Mar 20, 2008)

We call ours the 'rig', or 'boo-boo bus' ( some cases boo-boo wagon)
Its funny how these things spread like crazy within the department!


----------



## Pittsburgh Proud (Mar 20, 2008)

emtangie850 said:


> We call ours the 'rig', or 'boo-boo bus' ( some cases boo-boo wagon)
> Its funny how these things spread like crazy within the department!



Boo Boo Bus..... I like it, kinda like the Band aid box, that's the neat terms I was hoping to hear. B)


----------



## FF2EMT (Mar 20, 2008)

Well I have heard everthing from meatwagon to unit to ambulance here in western Md but we usually call it the unit....


FF2
EMT-B
EMS Captain


----------



## Grady_emt (Mar 20, 2008)

I forgot to mention amb-A-lance!


----------



## BossyCow (Mar 21, 2008)

My oldest used to call it the AmBleeance when he was a baby, sort of stuck and a lot of us call it that now. My oldest is now 23 and doesn't call it at all. I think being raised in an EMS household, he has an aversion to anything emergency related.


----------



## ErinCooley (Mar 21, 2008)

BossyCow said:


> My oldest used to call it the AmBleeance when he was a baby, sort of stuck and a lot of us call it that now. My oldest is now 23 and doesn't call it at all. I think being raised in an EMS household, he has an aversion to anything emergency related.



That is EXACTLY what my 5 year old calls it.. he has a REALLY southern accent, its so cute!!


----------



## fortsmithman (Mar 21, 2008)

I've heard it called bus, rig, ambulance, or unit.


----------



## CFRBryan347768 (Apr 15, 2008)

Rig or bus most often


----------



## Airwaygoddess (Apr 15, 2008)

*Ambulance "names"*

The rig!  unless you give them pet names.  We have our type 3 BLS unit that we call "Ethel".  "Ethel" is kind of old and tired, and a big girl! ^_^


----------



## Katie (Apr 15, 2008)

rig, unit, ambulance, boo boo box


----------



## AJemt (Apr 15, 2008)

truck i think is most common.  also used are rig, amblance, buggy, unit, bus, bamblance, ambo, vanambulance or vanbulance, and beast.  in reference to the transport units/wheelchair vans - tard cart, window licker van.
in reference to a specific ambulance - either by number (the number 5 bus) or unit number (6-12-3, 3-8, 7-2); or by name - ie Christine (an old truck you had to be nice to or she wouldn't work, for ex one day the crew put her in drive to pull out of hte bay and she went backwards till they shut her off and restarted her), Banana Beast (another old truck that had a big yellow stripe down the side of it and REAL airhorns instead of just the junk ones most of hte other ambos have - also had the old cloth bench seats, etc.)......piece of s**t, and hunk of junk.


----------



## gcfd_rez31 (Apr 16, 2008)

well where i work, we have the van-type ambulances...

we sometimes call them the "trauma twinkies", "clown car", or "rig".


----------



## Jon (Apr 16, 2008)

Tard cart... haven't heard that one in a while... but I've heard it before for a paratransit van.

Jon


----------



## paramedix (Apr 16, 2008)

Ridryder911 said:


> You call it a bus here, they presume you work for a school. Never heard of that until I seen it on the EMS forums. We call then units, or rigs, truck in slang.
> 
> 
> R/R 911



Yip we call it a bus...

But we have a pvt company over here, we call their vehicle "smarty boxes" cause they have a whole lot of dots and different colors. Our vehicles... Anything from "meat wagon" to "disco rider".


----------



## Ops Paramedic (Apr 16, 2008)

Maybe a bit off the topic, but what you call a fly car, we cal a Response Car or Romeo vehicle.

As for the ambulance...it depends a lot on how quickly you need the vehicle, or on how long you have been waiting for it as to what it will be called on that particular moment...

To Rid:  Sometimes it feels like i work for a school, a nursery school!!


----------



## NJWhacker (Apr 16, 2008)

the usual ambulance, rig, bus, boo-boo bus, whammmbulance


----------



## emt 92591 (Apr 17, 2008)

Ambie or bus to hell lol or S**t Rig lol


----------



## Short Bus (Apr 19, 2008)

Truck or Unit most of the time.  Depending on who we are hauling, it maybe a big white taxi or the Short bus.  Our convo trucks are called slug buggys or granny getters.  If they have a real pt on board they are GALS trucks.  Geriatric ALS.


----------



## MAC4NH (Apr 21, 2008)

In the paid departments we call it a truck.  On the volunteer side it's always a rig.


----------



## aussieemt1980 (Apr 21, 2008)

My 3 year old Daughter calls them an "Ambludance" which is pretty cute. Every siren she hears its "Hey Daddy, is that an Ambludance?"

I have used the term truck, bus, spew truck, frog mobile (in NSW for a while we had ambulances that said "ambulance" or "paramedic" on them - the frog mobile was for the paramedic ambulances), "you piece of rotten ******* ***** ****** ***** ***** ****** ***** *****" (a very old Mitsubishi L300 that would have gone faster over the side of a cliff - i threatened to do it. Supervisor thought I was joking - it was in another organisation), taxi, confined space truck (inside the back of course), "where the hell has that gone again" mobile.


----------



## brassguy (Apr 22, 2008)

I work for a private company, we usually call it an "insurance taxi"


----------



## aussieemt1980 (Apr 22, 2008)

Insurance Taxi - lol, will have to remember that one...


----------

