When I was a student and doing my college work experience program with a busy local fire department I had my first one. I can thank the captain for that one. I may have written this one up before but the gist of it was we called to a house for an unknown medical. The house had no power and was next to a vacant lot. There was an in-law suite in the back and that's where we found the body. I was the equipment mule so was following behind the crew. It was about 2 in the morning and as the captain rounded the corner to the room and shone his flashlight inside he just said, "Okay, back to the rig." He told me there was a monster in there and I didn't need to see that. Apparently he'd been dead for a long time and animals had been eating at him. I was more than okay with just turning on my heels and heading back to the fire engine.
A few months ago my crew was called out for an unknown medical again. This time it was early afternoon and sunny. We arrived at the address to find the police on scene. Apparently the patient was inside but couldn't get to the door and they could not find a way in. After talking to the patient through the door and searching all around for an alternate way in, we had to force entry through the front door. My firefighter did a great job and did very little damage, leaving the door usable.
However, what we found inside was far from it. The small room was knee deep in trash and filth. Everywhere. You couldn't really get through anywhere without wading through it. Our patient, a heavyset man with a cane, had fallen down and was unable to get up or get to the door. We were able to get him standing and then we retreated to the doorway to continue the conversation. He refused ambulance transport and said he was fine and that he just wasn't able to get up. We couldn't force him to go but we obviously addressed the elephant buried somewhere in the room. He proceeded to explain that he just moved in and the prior tenants left this mess. His landlord was giving him the first couple of months rent free if he arranged for the clean up. He was unable to physically do it himself and so was going to get a company to come do it. This story did not seem entirely credible especially when coupled with the fact the car in the driveway, which obviously had not moved in a long time, was filled to the brim with trash as well. Did the previous tenants leave their car behind too?
Today we got called out for a well-fare check on a known diabetic who no one had seen for a week and was not returning calls or texts. I did not recognize the address from the dispatch but I knew it instantly when I pulled the rig up to the house.
Yep, same house and still locked up tight. PD was on scene again and one of the same officers was there. We discussed how we got in before and if there were any better access points. All the doors were locked but there was a louvered window in the front that opened but we could not remove the panes and get in that way. Looking into the house it was remarkably cleaned up.
We moved around to the side yard and to a sliding glass door which again showed the place to be cleaned up and livable. There was one room we could not get to or see into though. We were able to force the slider by smashing off the deadbolt and turning the throw with a pair of pliers. Again, amazingly the door did not shatter and remained usable. However, as soon as we began getting a purchase on the slider the smell hit us. We knew where this was going. The ambulance was on scene and the crew brought us all masks to don before going in.
We masked up and removed the door from the tracks. One officer, my firefighter, and one of the ambulance crew headed in and I followed. They stopped as they got to the door of the room we hadn't been able to see and I heard them all say, "yeah, okay", and then my firefighter declared obvious signs of death (meaning we didn't have to go in and run an ekg strip to determine death in the field). At that point I stopped and headed back outside. I decided this was just one more thing in my career that I did not need to see. I could handle it and I was curious but I knew the best course of action was to just go. I can surmise enough from the descriptions provided by those who did go in, which I will not repeat here.
It's sad that he was able to get help and get the place cleaned up and back on track but couldn't do anything about his own health to save himself. For us it was a blessing in disguise, as crass as that may sound, in that we didn't have to work the code blue or deal with the mess again when we arrived.
We put the slider back on its tracks, gathered info from and for the cops, and cleared the scene to hit the grocery store to shop for dinner and then went back to the station for lunch.
