Anguish in frantic 911 call on kids
3 badly injured by fireworks; ‘Somebody blew their face off’
As a frantic young boy calls 911, a friend burned by fireworks cries in the background: “I want my Mama!”
It was about 7 p.m. Sunday at McNair Park in Pompano Beach when three boys— ages 8, 9 and 11 — were maimed by the explosives. One child lost his hand; another boy lost fingers; and the third youngster was burned on his face and chest, according to a city official.
Neighbors reported hearing a “boom” from one of the explosives that went off inside the basketball courts in the park.
As the anguished child continues to wail in edited 911recordings released Tuesday by Pompano Beach Fire Rescue, a dispatcher seems to whisper “Oh God” to herself as
she’s helping the composed young caller care for his friend.
“Somebody just blew their face off with a firecracker and we need the ambulance,” the boy said. “His face is like, bust open and bleeding really bad … my friend. He needs help, like, it’s an emergency.”
His sobbing buddy won’t stay put.
“Be still, stay right here,” he said. “They’re coming to get you. You’re gonna be all right. You’re gonna be all right.”
To the dispatcher, the young caller said: “He’s crying, crying really bad. He bust his face with a firecracker. Are they on their way?”
Another caller, a man, tells a dispatcher, “I need paramedics right now at 27th Ave. A kid has blown his hand off with a firecracker and it’s bleeding really bad.”
A third caller asks that paramedics be sent to the Collier City neighborhood north of West Atlantic Boulevard and east of Florida’s Turnpike. Asked by
“They’re bleeding terrifically bad. You gotta hurry up, ma’am.” Caller, to 911 dispatcher
the dispatcher if anyone is hurt, hedescribedhowone child’s hand was almost gone and how another lost two fingers. “It’s very bad ma’am, very very bad.”
A woman is the last caller on the tape, and at first she sees two of the wounded boys.
“Their hands is blown up, ma’am. They’re bleeding terrifically bad,” she tells a dispatcher. “You gotta hurry up, ma’am.”
Like the other callers to 911, she tries to get the kids to be still.
“Sit down,” she tells them. “Y’all losing too much blood. … Oh my God.”
She tells the dispatcher she believes the boys were joined by their parents and were picked up by a white GMC Yukon SUV. She gives the dispatcher the license plate information. As she continueswatching sirens can be heardandshe says, “It’s three [boys]. It’s three. Paramedics just got here. There’s more coming.” Paramedics took the children in three ambulances to Broward Health Medical Center in Fort Lauderdale. At least two of the boys are brothers, said Sandra King, spokeswoman forPompanoBeach Fire Rescue.
A hospital spokeswoman said the children’s parents declined to talk with reporters.
It was not immediately clear how the children came in contact with the fireworks. Their names have not been released.
A spokeswoman for the Florida Department of Children and Families said by email that a call was made to the hotline and that its Broward County contractor, the Broward Sheriff’s Child Protective Investigations Section, is investigating the incident.