PANAMA CITY BEACH -- Someone stole an ambulance number 18.
The ambulance was parked at the EMS station on Hutchison Boulevard around 11 p.m. Friday. Paramedics had stopped to resupply the vehicle; while their backs were turned the ambulance disappeared, said EMS Division Chief Corky Young.
The crew assigned to number 18 got back to work in a different ambulance, Young said, so “there was no service interruption.”
Dozens of local law enforcement officers searched “every nook and cranny” of the beach overnight and turned up nothing. That the ambulance had not been located by Saturday afternoon had Young perplexed.
“I expected this thing to be found about a half-hour after sunrise,” he said.
Young could not release too many details of the investigation into the theft.
The ambulance is white with orange paint in a checkerboard pattern and the number 18 and word “medic” painted in blue. Anyone who sees should call 911, Young said.