I work a 24 hour shift. The normal rotation is 24 hours on duty and 72 hours off. Sounds like a great schedule right? At into the equation that I need extra money and extra shifts and all 72 hours off is is a space to fill with another 24 hour shift. I have been working these damn 24s on a day, off a day, for over two weeks. I'm tired out and when I get tired out i get moody and short tempered. I don't like myself when I'm tired out.

The aggravations for this particular shift started the night before even, when my partner called in sick. The girl that will be replacing him is not a bad person, or a bad medic, or a bad conversationalist, she is just not my partner. I'm pissed.


The day didn't start out the best. I pulled into the office parking lot in my old truck, parked, grabbed my coffee but none of my gear and headed in, butting out my smoke on the way. My partner (for today anyway) was already checking the truck. 808. 808 is an old truck with almost 200000kms on it. My regular truck, 180, is sitting in the next bay. 180 is a brand new full sized mod, i love 180. The reason someone has burdened me with this POS ambulance my partner is currently rifling through as i found out, is that sometimes it doesn't start. They want me to drive the ambulance that sometimes doesn't start so that if we are near our fleet center today they can fix it. In the meantime I have to worry about our truck not starting. I just shake my head and log 808 on for 24 hours, ACP unit. Dispatch replies over the radio; "Roger 808, 24 hour ACP unit, CAD time is 0633, HAVE A GOOD DAY". You too i reply, knowing full well that the dispatcher has a shit change at 7. He will in all likely hood have a good day, I may not.


And the waiting begins, working rural ambulance is not the most action packed job in the world. I like it that way. I spend the first two hours of my shift watching TV. "808 copy control" we have a new dispatcher now, new in every sense of the word. New shift this morning, new as a dispatcher and new to being a paramedic. I'm hoping that her next words will not send me hours and hours down the road. I'm just not in the mood. I put on my best happy/business voice and reply; "808 go ahead". "808 post post you to fishing town for a bit please". Big sigh, piece of cake, a 20 minute drive down the road to cover the next base. Piece of cake.


Its 7 in the evening now. We spent a couple of hours in fishing town and returned to our base. The rain that sarted in a torrential downpour earlier has stopped and it is now sunny and warm. I am sitting out in front of the ambulance bays on the folding chair i tote around with me. Enjoying the warmth and my cigarette just a little too much. Tones drop over my portable. The ear blasting high/low tones that our dispatcher sets off as she notifies one of the 15 or so ambulances on our channel that there is a emergency call. I pay little attention, the calls are rarely for us it seems. "808, 808 mobile please for a incoming call" and the pager on my belt pics up the chorus. I throw my cigarette down, fold up my lawn chair and hop behind the wheel as my partner comes out into the bays. Answering dispatch on the truck radio, i am informed that we are heading for one of our local nursing homes, priority two for a fall assessment. No problem, the nursing home is right next door to our small rural hospital. Piece of cake.


1 in the morning. I'm asleep. Dead asleep. The 30 hours of overtime a week i have been putting in for the last few weeks has caught up to me big time. You would think that being so tired that sleep would have come easily but it didn't. After going to bed at midnight, i tossed and turned and it seems i had only just fallen asleep when the pager, now on the bedside table alongside my wallet, cell phone, drug pouch and fire pager, breaks into chorus. I groggily reach over and try to figure out which of the buttons turns on the back light. I might as well have not bothered, the alphanumeric screen in a green back

light simply says "go mobile for a incoming call". It could be anything anywhere.


I grab all my gear off the bedside table, my white uniform shirt off the back of my chair and slide my feet into my zip-up boots sitting at the side of my bed and trudge out to the ambulance bay. Throwing everything in a pile on the drivers seat i reach into the truck and grab the radio mike, "808 mobile" there is no response for a few seconds. I throw my shirt up over my head and start tucking it in when dispatch responds. "808 mobile for the 101 highway, single vehicle motor vehicle accident, one patient, no-one trapped, no-one thrown, everything else unknown". This is not going to be a piece of cake.


The 101 highway is something near the equivalent of a U.S interstate, but without a median dividing eastbound and westbound lanes. In fact, in most spots it is nothing more than a two lane highway with 100km/h being the speed limit. The 101 is responsible for more driver fatalities than any other road in the province.


The trip from our station, through rural town and on up to the highway takes less than five minutes. As we approach the highway on ramp and i rev the engine i remember exactly what speeds are usually involved in these accidents and I regret not having asked for the fire department to be dispatched. I'm a member of the rural town fire department, i know the boys wouldn't have minded coming out even if the crash turned out to be minor. Well, we will be on scene in a minute, i think, might as well wait and see what we have. Hopefully these extra minutes will not make the difference in someone living and dying.


As we crest over a large hill i see the four way flashers alongside the road come into view and start slowing the ambulance. The car involved in the crash is sitting with the truck against the guard rail. What is left of the front end of the car is protruding half way into the eastbound lane of the highway. I park the ambulance right in the middle of the eastbound lane and hope that the emergency lights will ensure that people slow and use caution around the scene. It also gives me and my partner a shield to work behind. My mind comes back to the accident scene in front of us. I cant even tell what type of car this used to be. Front end is completely mangled, the truck has disappeared and you cant tell what is car and what is the guard rail. Through the smashed windshield i can see the face of a man sitting in the passenger seat. The drivers seat is empty.

A quick scene size up and we find that the driver has fled from the scene, the passenger in not pinned in the car but the doors are jammed and there is debree all over the highway. "Defiantly gonna need fire" my partner mutters and i pass the information along to our dispatcher. Soon enough the fire pager hanging from my pocket is alive with noise and I know that rural town fire is responding. Before long we will have more help than we know what to do with.

The passenger is in rough shape. He will survive I'm sure. While i was calling fire my partner had squeezed herself through the rear passenger window of the car. She is busy assessing the patient the best she can from withing the crumpled area that used to be the rear passenger compartment of the car. There isn't much more for me to do. I got some gear set up nearby; the backboard and straps, head blocks and stretcher. Got everything for a couple big IVs set up in the back of the ambulance. It seems that fire is on scene withing minutes, even though it was probably closer to 10. My mentality has returned to this being a piece of cake.

Now we are cooking with gasoline, i think, as i see the long train of rotators, strobes and LEDs making a quick procession down the hill. Before i know it we have more help on scene than i know what to do with. Rural town fire department doesn't mess around. They have brought a pumper, a tanker, a rescue/utility truck and a 4x4 transport. They are a good bunch of guys too. Most of them are very close friends of mine, my best friends, my brothers.

Within minutes we have the drunk passenger out of the vehicle and into the ambulance. A couple quick IVs and we are en route to rural town health center. The nurses and doctors in our small rural hospital are some of the best I have ever worked with. They will take the best care of our patient, despite the fact that once out of the car he became the typical belligerent drunk. These girls have the patience of a saint and as I'm sitting in the nurses lounge contemplating this, with the sounds of our drunken passenger echoing down the hallway, the pager starts its merry chorus again.

4 am.