Once, on night shift, I got sent to an injury accident way in the south part of the city. It was the middle of winter, about 2AM, and blizzard conditions. Dispatch said the accident was between a car and a snow plow, but they had no other information. I arrived in the area, and couldn't see a damned thing. It was just a wall of white, horizontal snow.
As I was straining to find the accident scene through my side window, a face suddenly appeared through the snow, pressed up against the window glass. The face was cut to shreds and covered with blood. I jumped about a foot. I had found my accident.
It turned out the snow plow had run a stop sign at the end of a side street, and T-boned a car passing on a main drag. The plow blade had cut a huge hole in the side of the car, and shattered all the windows which carved up the occupants.
I got an ambulance en route and got out of my car. It struck me right away that it was pretty cold, but I had to get on with it. I quickly realized I couldn't keep my gloves off long enough to write more than a few lines on the accident report before I'd have to put them back on. Then, the ink in my pen froze. I had to return to my squad several times for fresh pens before I could get the bare essentials written down. My coat was nothing short of worthless. My hands and face were numb, and I was shivering hard.
A buddy arrived on scene with his new smart phone. He dialed in one of his apps, and gave me the weather report. The wind chill was -61 degrees F.
1 comment:
Even the crackheads probably had enough sense to stay indoors. Damn that's cold
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