VOLUSIA COUNTY, Fla. — When an emergency call came through for a man having a heart attack as the roaring wind and pouring rain of Hurricane Matthew buffeted Volusia County, most emergency vehicles would have never made it in time.
The Volusia County Sheriff’s Office was able to make it, though, and the victim got the medical attention he needed in time.
Emergency responders credited the VCSO's 18-ton MRAP for letting them make it through the storm.
“This guy, by all rights, should have been dead,” the VCSO said on its Facebook page. “They kept him alive in the back of that truck.”
Deputy Eddie Hart was behind the wheel of the massive vehicle, purchased as surplus from the federal government and originally designed for military use.
Hart had to dodge downed power lines and sometimes had to steer in reverse to get around debris.
“When the hurricane was running up the coast, we were in the New Smyrna Beach and Port Orange area,” he said. “You could actually see stuff just swirling around, that that wind was coming right at us.”
As emergency personnel took the heart attack victim, who was not named, to the hospital in Daytona Beach, winds were gusting in excess of 100 mph.
The MRAP, though, “didn’t sway at all,” Hart said.
The VCSO responded to several other 911 calls using the military vehicle during Hurricane Matthew, including a stroke patient and someone seriously injured in a fall.
MRAP is an abbreviation for: Mine Resistant Ambush Protected/Armored Personnel Carrier.