By David Abel, Globe Staff
The Boston Globe
Copyright 2006 Globe Newspaper Company
Despite a State Police escort through detours caused by Big Dig tunnel closings, a 64-year-old man died yesterday during the 50 minutes it took to get him from Logan International Airport to Boston Medical Center by ambulance, officials said.
The Stoughton man, whose name was not released yesterday, had collapsed in the limousine lot next to Terminal A yesterday afternoon and died during the ride to the hospital, said Phil Orlandella, a spokesman for the Massachusetts Port Authority, which runs Logan.
“Even with all the traffic, I’m not so sure that made a difference,” said Jim Hooley, superintendent in chief of Boston EMS. “He was getting care from the very beginning. He was pretty gravely ill from the start.”
State Police arrived on the scene shortly before 4 p.m. and tried to resuscitate the man, who apparently was suffering from cardiac arrest, Orlandella and Hooley said. A taxi dispatcher brought one of the airport’s defibrillators to the troopers, who administered CPR and three shocks, Orlandella said.
At 3:51, Boston EMS received its 222d call of the day, an urgent request for help at Logan, Hooley said. Two minutes later, he said, dispatchers sent Ambulance 7 one of 25 ambulances on duty at the time, five more than before the tunnel closings from East Boston. It arrived on the scene at 4 o’clock and emergency medical technicians began administering aid, Hooley said.
At 4:02, he said, EMS sent another ambulance carrying more-sophisticated equipment, Paramedic 1, from downtown Boston. At 4:12, after traveling through the Callahan Tunnel, it met the other ambulance in front of the Ted Williams Tunnel, which was heavily congested, he said.
Paramedics leapt out of their ambulance and took the more advanced equipment to treat the patient in Ambulance 7, Hooley said. At 4:26, the two ambulances entered the Ted Williams Tunnel westbound, and with traffic crawling toward the South Boston exit that is the detour for traffic from Logan, their State Police escorts took them across the closed opposite lanes, the wrong way up a closed onramp, and across surface streets before arriving at Boston Medical Center at 4:50, he said.
Hooley denied that the ambulances tried to go through the Sumner Tunnel before using the Ted Williams Tunnel, or that they went through the Interstate 90 connector tunnel, where Milena Del Valle was killed July 10. The fatal ceiling collapse has caused a series of Big Dig closings for inspections and repairs.
Hooley said that while ambulances should take less than 10 minutes to respond to high-priority calls, travel time to the hospital depends on traffic and other factors.
Jon Carlisle, a spokesman for the Executive Office of Transportation, said ambulances are allowed to use a lane through the Ted Williams also being used by Silver Line buses.