Please allow me to begin by saying that our county contracts with ETMC (East Texas Medical Center) for EMS coverage.
11:30 p.m., our station is toned out for a structure fire. We get on scene, start taking care of business, and two of our guys are injured. This was a meth lab and the investigation is still in progress, so I won't go into any details there; however I'm nominating this situation for the "WTF of the Year Award."
Command contacts dispatch to advise them that we need EMS...asap. What came out of the radio after that sorta frosted my mini wheats...
"Command, please advise your address."
"Ma'am, we're at the structure fire on xyz road."
"Command, what are the numerics?"
hadNow, who toned us out if
they didn't have the address? They themselves had given us some pretty specific instructions on how to get there, and we don't necessarily memorize addresses, esp. when they are on county roads with 5 digits. Our addresses go something like this: '13750 county road 41515'. So, if we tend to put the addy out of our mind once we get on scene, wouldn't that be understandable?
I'm still trying to figure out how they dispatched us if they didn't know where we were.
It was discussed later, and someone tried to attribute the problem to ETMC dispatch. It seems that they won't roll a box until they have a numeric address to enter into their system. That leaves us wondering how they dispatch personnel to mva's on remote stretches of rural highways.
Is it just me, or does there seem to be a problem here? Please tell me that it's not a conspiracy. If I take the little pink pill, will I feel better about it tomorrow?