When I first came on the job, the only medical aid runs we went on were car accidents. But in the 1970’s, we took over the medical section of San Diego so we took care of every medical run in the city. That’s also about the same time that we acquired medics on the rigs too. This was a run that was memorable to me as a heart breaker.

We went on a run for a heart attack. He was an older fellow who had just ridden a bicycle, and we found him sitting on the couch. We worked on him, and when the paramedics got there we loaded him into the ambulance. But they said that only one person could ride in the ambulance with the patient. So I told them, “Hey you know there is a little girl here.” But they said there wasn’t anything they could do about it because the rules said they could only take one extra person, and that was the mom.    

I couldn’t leave the little girl there by herself. There was too much trauma. Our rules also said that we couldn’t take any civilians on the rig with us, but that night I put her in the front seat with us and we took her to the hospital. Other relatives were notified and they also met at the hospital. On the way, she talked about how excited she was to tell her dad and her friends that she got to ride in the fire engine. She was really impressed. Her dad had died from the heart attack, so that was a heart-breaker, and a hard run. But I did get her to the hospital on the fire engine where she could meet the rest of her family.