INDIANAPOLIS -- Firefighters at an Indianapolis fire station opened the door early Friday morning to a one-of-a-kind request for help: A frantic woman, distressed because her pet raccoon was stoned off of too much weed.
The raccoon, according to Wayne Township Fire Dept. PIO Capt. Michael Pruitt, had been exposed to "too much" of someone else’s marijuana, and its owners were worried it was overdosing. Not knowing what to do, they brought it to Station 82.
“The raccoon was very lethargic,” Pruitt said. “She started explaining what had happened. There wasn’t really much we could do, it was just the sort of thing that was going to take time.”
Recordings of Southwest District’s radio chatter show the raccoon had IMPD officers baffled as well -- at first, simply over what substance the raccoon was, in fact, high on.
“Apparently they have a pet raccoon that got into their meth,” an unidentified officer is logged saying at 3:57 a.m.
Listen to audio of police trying to decipher the situation below:
A minute later, dispatchers try to clarify.
“Sir, Speedway doesn’t have anything, but fire did call across the hall and say that it was a raccoon that overdosed on somebody’s heroin.”
Thirty seconds later, a second Southwest District officer radios in that he is sitting at a firehouse – and sees no sign of a raccoon in distress:
Ofc. 1: “I’m sitting at one of the firehouses. No pet raccoons are overdosing here.”
Ofc. 2: “Well if they show up, you Narcan him.”
Ofc. 1: “Way too weird. I’m leaving.
Ofc. 2: “10-4”
Ultimately, Pruitt said, the raccoon’s owners took the animal home to sleep off its high.
“We hope that everything worked out with the raccoon,” Pruitt said. “We’d be sad to hear that it didn’t.”
