Skip to content

ONTARIO: Skunk rescue by paramedic a stinking success

Skunk’s head was trapped in Tim Horton’s Iced Capp cup

Local paramedics are not making much of a stink about how one of them rescued a skunk whose head was stuck in a Tim Hortons cup early Thursday morning.

Two paramedics from County of Simcoe Paramedic Services, normally stationed in Stroud, were in Bradford around 3 a.m. to provide backup as the Bradford crew was on an emergency call, said Laura Gillies, an advanced care paramedic and the OPSEU Local 303 secretary.

Paramedics Craig and Don, who declined to give their last names, “saw the skunk walking down the road bumping into the curb and saw the Iced Capp cup on its head — lid and all — and knew he would die if they didn’t help him,” she said.

Craig put on protective equipment, including gown, glasses and gloves, and “was able to get it off without hurting him or getting sprayed, and the skunk waddled off seemingly unaffected.”

It is not the first time Simcoe County paramedics have encountered animals on the job.

“It seems every month or two in the spring/summer someone is herding ducks off the road or moving snapping turtles,” Gillies said, with a laugh.