Three Habersham County Emergency Services employees are recovering from injuries they suffered when the ambulance they were riding in wrecked on Interstate 85 in Gwinnett County.
EMT Phyllis Standridge, 56, of Lula, and paramedics Keith Borton, 34, of Cornelia, and Brandon Fields, 35, of Rabun Gap, were treated and released from the hospital following the early afternoon accident on October 28. They were transporting a patient to Emory University Hospital Midtown in Atlanta when the crash occurred. The wreck did not injure the patient, says Habersham County Emergency Services Director Chad Black.
According to the Georgia State Patrol report, the ambulance was traveling in the far left lane with its emergency lights and siren activated when it struck the rear of the Cadillac Escalade in front of it. The impact set off a chain reaction rear-end wreck involving two other vehicles.
Standridge was driving the ambulance. She slammed on the brakes to avoid hitting the vehicle in front of her after it abruptly braked, says Black, and the ambulance slid on wet pavement. All four vehicles wound up stopped in the lefthand lane about one mile north of State Route 140/Jimmy Carter Boulevard near Indian Trail Road.
Black was in Gainesville preparing for a regional trauma conference when he got the news.
“The call I got was, ‘Your ambulance was in a wreck and your driver is unconscious,'” he says. “My heart dropped.”
Gwinnett County Fire and Emergency Services transported the three emergency workers to Northside Hospital in Gwinnett and carried their patient on to Emory. EMS also transported three others involved in the wreck to the hospital.
The Georgia State trooper investigating the accident issued Standridge a warning for following too closely.
Ambulance is salvageable
The wrecked ambulance was one of the newest additions to Habersham County’s fleet. The Frazer infectious disease unit was purchased through CARES Act funding. Black says the specially-equipped unit may have saved the crew’s lives. The push guard on the front of the cab that was installed to protect against deer on rural roads helped to minimize the impact.
“All the safety stuff held up and, what could have been a tragedy, was not,” Black tells Now Habersham. He says HCES will now make push guards standard equipment on all future vehicle purchases because “it made a huge difference.”
The wreck damaged the ambulance’s Ford Chassis. Black says that will have to be replaced, but the ambulance box is still intact and useable. He says they plan to remount it onto a new chassis, allowing the county to salvage a significant part of its CARES-funded purchase.
