Bomb Threat

When I first started working in 911 for the Alaska Troopers I had training with my supervisor Julie (not a real name).  I was doing pretty good so she went to a meeting and told me I was on my own.  I was excited and scared at the same time. Adrenaline was running wild hoping for the phone to ring and afraid it would at the same time.

The business line lite up.  Alaska State Troopers, how can I help you?
caller: Is Julie there?
me:  Not at this time, may I take a message?
caller: no, I have to talk to her and I have to talk to her now.
me: I am sorry sir but if it is an emergency I can do my best to get a hold of her as soon as possible.
caller:  Well you are going to have to or else the bomb is going to go off first.

My heart stopped...BOMB! OMG! BOMB!

I started trying to wave my hands around to get my Sgt. in the other rooms attention where I could get them to trace the call as this was before enhanced 911 that shows you the address, when he looked up I mouthed trace this call, bomb and he grabbed the phone and started dialing.

Trying to stay calm I said: Sir where is the bomb?
caller: at the hospital (by now the Sgt is also monitoring the call)
me: where at the hospital is it located?
caller: you will know when it goes off, you had better get Julie and you better get the fire department and all the police up there and get those people out.
Me: We are trying to sir could you give me some more information as to the time the bomb is suppose to go off? (I am thinking I have to keep him on the line until we can get it traced)

Julie walks through the door and I put the phone up in the air and start telling her what the guy said and that he  had asked for her. Sgt. is busy listening, ordering troops into position,tracing call, calling more officers from home, trying to get hospital administrator on the line etc.

Julie grabs the phone from my hand and says "Bob knock it off we don't have time for this!  Why are you upset today?"

caller:  I am so glad they found you, someone called me a name and I was going to show them they can't call me names.
Julie:  It is ok Bob, lets talk about this. She tells everyone to abort all orders and send everyone home it is ok. it is one of our local mental cases that when he flips out he starts calling in emergencies as he likes to watch all the officers run around code 3 and he likes the attention he gets so Julie gives him his attention and he is fine.

A lesson that I learned right off in dealing with mental problems. A lot of the time all they want is someone to talk to. Later in life we had one in Oregon that used to call with all kinds of problems. I would talk to her if I was not busy sometimes for an hour but then she was happy. If I was busy I would get her talking long enough to make sure she did not have a real emergency and then I would put her on hold and go about my other calls and once in a while pick up her line and say " I understand Kathy, tell me some more and then put her back on hold.  I was training a girl once and we were really busy and Kathy called and the trainee was monitoring all calls. Kathy told me her usual story about people trying to get her and they were hiding and watching her through her window and I said "oh no Kathy, tell me who you think they are and describe them in detail" and then I put her on hold.  I did not even look at the trainees face as I was really busy with several calls. I did my once in a while pick up the line and make some remark about "I don't blame you for being afraid so you be sure and tell me each noise you hear" and back on hold she went. Finally I picked up the line and she said "thanks Linda but they have left now and I can sleep" I hung the phone up.

After about 1/2 hour things slowed down and I had not even remembered that Kathy had called and my trainee said "why in the world did you put that poor lady that had a prowler on hold, you told me that was a very dangerous call for an officer"  I then explained to her about mental patients.

Kathy used to also come to the emergency room with a broken toe all the time. We had a new doctor on and the new admitting clerk called that they had a female with a broken toe out front. I went out and sure enough it was Kathy.  I said "what is wrong Kathy?"  She said "I think I broke my toe"  I said "oh no, let me see. I looked at her perfectly fine toe and said hang on Kathy and I will get your medicine for you.  I went into the ER and got her a glass of water and took to her and told her I put her medicine in the glass and she was to drink every bit of it two swallows at a time. Don't drink it fast and her pain would go away"  She set there for almost 1/2 hr drinking her meds two swallows at a time and said "Oh thank you Linda, you always know what to do when I have a problem"  Again she was just lonely and wanted someone to give her a little attention.

The doctor said at first he thought I was the crazy one when I said I will go get your meds as I can't dose meds....lol  Of course everyone at the hospital became very acquainted with Kathy in a hurry.  The main thing was to make sure that she did not have a real complaint this time.

Another mental I will call Larry loved the attention and we had a new EMT on board. We had several people hurt but all minor. Myself and my boss looked up and there was our new EMT in the back of the ambulance with Larry giving him a secondary survey saying "where do you hurt?"  Asking all the questions he says "Did your seat belt hit you in the chest to make it hurt?"  Larry: "I did not have a seat belt?" EMT: "did you hit the dash then to make your chest hurt?"  Patient "no?"  EMT: "where were you in the car?"  Patient: "oh I wasn't in the car" EMT:  "did the car hit you?"  Patient "No"  EMT:  "did you fall and injure your chest?" Patient "no" I was just walking by and this looked like fun"  EMT looks at me and the boss and everyone is already gone from accident as it was just a fender bender and the boss and me are sitting the sidewalk laughing so hard tears are running down our cheeks as we watch the new guy try to get this guy out of his ambulance.  We knew cause we had already been there before.......

Yep mental patients often just want attention because a lot of people are afraid of them or don't want to talk to them so they use the emergency services to get some attention and if we have the time we should give them that attention as everyone needs someone to care.  If we don't have time we should always try and figure out a way to give them attention, sometimes they will even call you back in a an hour.