911 Dispatcher Helps Couple Deliver Baby Girl Inside Irvine Home
IRVINE (CBSLA.com) — An Irvine couple is enjoying their newborn after she was born at home with help and guidance from a 911 dispatcher and a birthing coach.
The 911 call captured Mishele Richards, a dispatcher, guide the couple after the baby came a little early.
"Well, the father said there's no way they were going to make it to the hospital, and I asked him if it was the first child, and he said, 'No, it was the second.' So, that's generally a prompt for us that things are going to happen pretty fast," Richards said.
Richards kept calm and composed on the other end of the phone line as she helped a nervous dad with the assistance of a birthing coach deliver a baby inside their Irvine home.
In her 16 years as a dispatcher for the Orange County Fire Authority, Richards has helped more than 20 911 callers deliver babies.
The baby was born healthy and one week early.
"Delivering the babies is the best part of our job because it's bringing a life into the world, instead of something tragic happening," Richards said.
