by Christian Burkin
The Record
Copyright 2007 The Record
STOCKTON, Calif. — Following a house fire in north Stockton on Thursday, the Fire Department and a neighbor who called 911 said the ambulance company that handled the call was slow to react.
It was not, according to the company, American Medical Response. And San Joaquin County Emergency Medical Services Administrator Dan Burch on Monday said AMR’s handling of the call appeared to be swift.
It took 1 minute, 47 seconds for AMR to relay to firefighters the Thursday morning call about a fire on Santa Rosa Way, AMR spokesman Jason Sorrick said Monday.
The Fire Department said its dispatchers handle most fire calls in 20 to 40 seconds and that AMR’s response -- by its count at least 2 minutes, 21 seconds -- was slow. Battalion Chief Mike Lilienthal said firefighters first learned of the fire not from AMR but from a neighbor who pounded on the door of a nearby fire station.
Chris Maupin said it likely took him less than a minute to drive to the station, about six blocks away.
“I said, ‘Hey, there’s a fire over there!’ ” Maupin said.
Firefighters arrived at the fire about two minutes later, Lilienthal said.
Bob Howze, a neighbor who called 911, became furious and said “This is in Stockton!” when a dispatcher asked if the fire was in Turlock, according to a recording of the call provided by AMR.
His call had gone first to the California Highway Patrol, as cellular calls in the county do, then to AMR. Howze, who in his call identified himself as a “retired fireman,” became upset when the dispatcher asked about Turlock and when he learned he was speaking to AMR, a Fire Department rival, according to the tape of the call. When the dispatcher asked for his telephone number, he hung up.
AMR called Howze back, and he said, “I don’t want to talk to you people, because I’m a retired fireman and I don’t like you anyway, so goodbye,” according to the tape.
Howze said Monday he has never been a firefighter but was so upset during the call that he might have said he was.
Howze had no reason to be upset, Sorrick said. The street name he gave matched streets in six cities, and the dispatcher was trying to find the location of the fire, Sorrick said.
Howze said that after he said he was in Stockton, he had no time to talk to AMR; he had a hose in hand and was busy trying to prevent his house from catching fire.
The Fire Department and AMR have been involved in a bitter row since AMR last year won the exclusive right to run ambulances here, decimating the city’s fledgling ambulance division. The city continues to dispatch ambulances in some areas, and the two sides are involved in a dispatch-related lawsuit.
The Fire Department dispatches its own engines, but AMR acts as an intermediary when fires are reported on cell phones. Thursday’s fire was put out within 25 minutes of the Fire Department’s arrival, officials said.
The home was unoccupied, and no one was injured, Lilienthal said. The cause of the blaze, which did $200,000 in damage to the house and its contents and also licked the side of Howze’s home, remains under investigation, Lilienthal said.
Howze and one other person have formally complained to the Fire Department about the incident, Lilienthal said. The Fire Department said it is investigating the complaints. AMR said it welcomed a formal review.