Pepper Spray

Some of the best moments working in EMS are the truly absurd events we are often party to.  My usual Rescue partner, Ugly, and I have spent a lot of time laughing in the front of the truck after clearing the hospital or documenting a refusal, taking a moment to point out all the ridiculous things that have just happened.

One night at about 1:30 AM we are dispatched to a bar in town for an unknown medical– "meet police on scene."  I'm working with Ugly and Medic-Trunk-Monkey (MTM), an old friend of mine.  The bar is only two blocks away, so we beat the police there.

Dismounting our vehicle, we're confronted with a scene that is neither chaotic nor calm; about fifteen patrons are milling around in front of the exit, but unlike most scenes where someone is hurt in a crowd, there is no focal point.  I hear a few scattered coughs from the crowd, and notice someone spitting.

"What happened?" I ask no one in particular.

"Someone sprayed pepper spray in the bar," one of the bar-goers tells me.  

"Is anyone left inside?" I ask him.

"Nah, man, everybody got the hell out of there.  It's impossible to breathe in there."  

We look around, but don't see anybody who looks acutely ill.  Pepper spray is a great tool for the police to use in subduing combative suspects, and can often take the fight out of very angry people, but has to be used with caution; spraying OC indoors or upwind can result in unintended exposure.  

The police officer, a well-liked female cop, pulls up to the scene.  We learn that the pepper-sprayer has fled, but they know who he is.  

At this point, we figure that anybody who is ill enough to merit treatment will approach us.  The cop asks us if anybody is inside "I don't know, but we're not going in there to find out," I tell her.  "Pfff, me, neither," she says.  A short while later, a firefighter who works as a bouncer at the bar shows up and walks into the building, coming out almost immediately, rubbing his eyes.  "Yup, that's definitely pepper spray," he tells us.

The four of us stand in a line at the curb, watching the drama unfold; one group smokes cigarettes, two women excitedly drunk-dial acquaintances to gossip about the story, and others mill around not really knowing what to do.  At some point a man comes out of the crowd and starts talking to us–small talk, or telling us about what happened.  I can tell he's inebriated, mostly from the way he stands in front of our group without looking at anyone in particular.  He talks, we stand there, we nod, we smile, he keeps talking, we keep nodding and standing there.  

"Well, I'm out of here," the cop says abruptly, shrugging, and gets back into her car.  We turn and start to shuffle back to the Rescue.  

No sooner has the door to the cab closed when Ugly asks us: "Do either of you have any clue what that guy has been talking about for the last five minutes?"  We look at each other, and shrug.  We all just kind of assumed that someone had been paying attention.  We laugh–none of us had heard a single word he'd said.  "Get us out of here," I tell Ugly, "I'm dying."

It feels hard to capture the humor in writing, but I think the dispatchers probably hear the three of us laughing a few minutes later when I call us "Clear–No EMS needed."