Middletown Baby Born At 2 A.M. Monday At Home, In Midst Of Historic Blizzard

MIDDLETOWN, NJ — While most people were huddled inside their homes Sunday night, riding out a historic blizzard that pummeled the Jersey Shore and all of New Jersey, the volunteer EMTs of Lincroft First Aid Squad were staffed at their building on Hurley's Lane.

They wanted to be prepared in case any emergency calls came in during the snowstorm.

And one did: At 1:40 a.m. Monday, Lincroft First Aid received a dispatch from 911; a woman was 36 weeks pregnant and was experiencing pain.

She was at home with her family, in their home off Kings Highway, very close to the Middletown ShopRite (exact location withheld for their privacy).

"It was the peak of the blizzard," said Dan Fowler, a volunteer member of Lincroft First Aid who was on duty that night. "And the call was weird — it just said pain, it did not say she was in labor. It's a 15-minute drive from where we are in Lincroft to where she was, but it took longer because we just had to go really slowly. We drove two ambulances over there and the one with four-wheel drive was OK, but the other one was definitely slipping."

"The visibility was really bad and the roads were very icy at that time. It had gone from wet snow earlier on Sunday, but by the middle of the night the temperatures had dropped and things had iced over."

The first ambulance got there just in time: With the help of EMTs, the woman delivered a baby boy 18 minutes after that initial 911 call. The baby was born at 1:58 a.m. in the downstairs bathroom of the home. Fowler drove the second ambulance and he got there right after 2 a.m.

"The mom was in her 30s and it was her first baby," he shared. "From my understanding it was just completely unexpected. She felt the contractions coming and then she had the baby."

Fowler said the new mom was surrounded by her family and her parents, and everyone "was in a really happy" mood. Lincroft EMS was the first to arrive on scene, followed minutes later by Hackensack Meridian paramedics, then Middletown Police and firefighters.

"They were actually all very happy people. They were just really happy the baby was born successfully," he said. "From there, we drove both mom and baby to Riverview Medical Center, right down Rt. 35. I drove the ambulance with the baby and the grandmother of the baby rode with me. She was talking to me the entire time; she was telling us the baby's name and how they chose that name. They were just thrilled."

"The ER at Riverview knew we were coming and they took us right up to Labor & Delivery," he said. "The mother and baby were healthy. The last I heard is they were in good health and nothing unusual to report."

All in all, the baby boy arrived on a night of calamity, when electricity was out all over town, conditions were so bad it will illegal to drive on the roads and New Jersey was getting buried under two feet of snow. Middletown ended up receiving more than 24 inches of snow, according to the National Weather Service.

It will certainly go down as one blizzard this Middletown family will never forget.

"They were all extremely happy. Mom delivered a healthy baby boy," said Fowler.

And what is Fowler's advice for driving in a blizzard? Well first of all, don't. But if you have to:

"Don't panic. Stay calm. Drive under the speed limit; take it nice and slow."

In addition to Fowler, Chris Nolan, Hannah Guthrie, Danny Burke and Kevin Guether were the volunteer Lincroft EMTs who assisted in the delivery the baby Sunday night.