A Jacksonville man was killed Saturday night after being struck by a MEMS ambulance on Highway 65.
According to an Arkansas State Police preliminary fatal crash summary, 53-year-old John Dollar was attempting to remove an injured dog from the roadway at about 9:45 p.m. when he was struck by the ambulance’s right front fender.
“We consider this to be a terrible tragedy, and it is the first accident involving a fatality in my 11 yeas with MEMS,” MEMS director Jon Swanson said on Monday. “Our thoughts and prayers are very much with the family.”
Swanson said the driver of the ambulance was a three-year MEMS employee in his early 40s who had “no issues with his driving that I can recall.” MEMS is investigating the incident, he said, and counseling has been offered to the ambulance crew, as he said is normally done after “what we consider to be high-stress incidents.”
MEMS was transporting a patient at the time of the accident. Swanson said MEMS policy allows traveling without activated emergency lights or sirens when a patient’s life is not in immediate danger. Without lights and sirens, the ambulance crew would have been under normal speed limit restrictions according to Arkansas law.
According to the preliminary ASP report, the ambulance driver swerved to avoid Dollar, but was unable to prevent the collision.
The paramedic in the back of the ambulance had stabilized the patient being transported, Swanson said, so the paramedic “immediately began care for the patient who was struck.” Other rescue personnel and an air ambulance were called to the scene, and Dollar was airlifted to Baptist Medical Center where he was pronounced dead, according to the ASP summary.
Dollar was a professor of history, political science and religion at Pulaski Technical College, where he was missed by staff and students, according to Pulaski Tech. director of public relations and marketing Tim Jones.
“He’s one of those people who made a real connection with his students, and I think that may be the most important thing he’ll leave behind: The people who he could share his passion for education with.”
Jones added that it was in keeping with Dollar’s kind-hearted character that he would have stopped his car in the night to help an injured animal. A facebook.com page entitled “Remembering Johnny Dollar” has been set up by the college.
A full report of the accident will be released later this week, ASP public information officer Bill Sadler said.
(Staff writer Joe Lamb can be reached at 505-1238 or by E-mail at joe.lamb@thecabin.net. Send us your news at www.thecabin.net/submit.)
