Newbie 911 Operator Helps LI Dad Deliver Baby On Side Of Road

EAST SETAUKET, N.Y. (CBSNewYork) -- A newly-hired Suffolk County 911 operator had a very happy call Thursday morning.

FRES Emergency Services Dispatcher Joseph Pucci was called to assist after receiving a phone call from a father whose wife was about to have a baby in transit, WCBS 880's Sophia Hall reported.

The couple was en route to Stony Brook University Hospital when they decided to pull over on the side of Route 347 in East Setauket, for fear they weren't going to make it in time.

"Contractions were approximately three minutes apart and currently no part of the baby was showing," Pucci said. "So originally I thought I was going to have some time before the baby was going to be born." 

But labor is unpredictable -- as Pucci was on the phone with the father, he heard the 38-year-old mother scream out loud, with the child fully on the way.

"After he said the baby was born, it kind of took me a second to process that in my head because it completely threw me for a loop," Pucci said.

Pucci gave step-by-step instructions to the father and guided him through the delivery process. He also provided information on how to keep the baby safe and how to tie the baby's umbilical cord with a string until medical personnel arrived.

The healthy baby boy was successfully delivered at around 10 a.m.

This is the couple's fourth child.