MAXWELL AIR FORCE BASE, Ala. -- An Air Force Reserve member was working in a civilian capacity in Odessa, Texas, on August 31, 2019, and helped provide life-saving first-aid to a woman suffering from three gunshot wounds.
Lt. Col. Nathaniel Ott, an instructor in Air University’s LeMay Center Joint Integration directorate, was in Odessa, Texas, working as an emergency room physician when he heard a “pop” from outside. Ott walked toward the nurses’ station, heard three more distinctive “pop” sounds and stepped outside to see a vehicle with nearby police attempting to assist the driver.
“I ran out across the field to where the vehicle was and, in the driver’s seat, was a young woman who had been shot from the passenger side; there were holes in the passenger side of her car,” said Ott. “She was bleeding pretty profusely and her arm had been broken.”
A paramedic on the scene had put a tourniquet on her arm to help control the bleeding. Ott assessed her condition and concluded the victim needed to be transported to a trauma center. He knew a blood transfusion was the only way to save her life and the ER where he was working is not equipped with blood products or trauma surgeons
One of the officers on the scene asked Ott if they should wait for an ambulance or get the victim into her police cruiser. The pair decided the victim couldn’t wait and needed to be transported immediately. While the officer and paramedic were assisting the victim, Ott ran back into the ER, grabbed IV components, brought a nurse with him and began working to turn the cruiser into an impromptu ambulance.
“Ambulances have a lot of restrictions on what they can do if there’s an active shooter situation and the police don’t, so that allowed the patient to get to the hospital quickly,” said Ott. “We then worked on transferring the patient. She was pretty weak and could only sort of stand up with us providing support. We got her into the back seat of the cruiser and the paramedic got into the other side, began working on getting an IV in and the cruiser took off.”
Despite the shooter having left the area initially, the group wasn’t completely safe.
“While we working on getting the patient transferred, the shooter drives by in front of us, maybe thirty feet away,” said Ott. “Fortunately, he wasn’t shooting at that time and there were quite a few police officers chasing him. It was chaotic - It’s one of those things you don’t really think about in that moment; you just sort of go and focus on your task.”
After passing by, the shooter pulled into a parking lot right next to the facility Ott was working in.
“We had patients in our ER and a police officer said, ‘Hey, you can’t go back there,’ and we told him, ‘Look, we have patients we have to take care of,’” said Ott. “They let us take a circuitous route around the gunfire to get back.”
The victim made it to the hospital and is in recovery.
Following the event, Ott made a point of taking care of what was important in his own life.
“What was next for me was wanting to hug my wife, Terah, and our five kiddos,” said Ott. “They were out of town at the time and took a few days to get back, but it just felt so good to hold them. It puts things in perspective.”
Before his transition from active duty to the Air Force Reserve, Ott served 13 years as an F-16 pilot. He then went to medical school and became an emergency physician.
“I can definitely say that training as a fighter pilot and then a year getting mortared in Iraq developed in me the ability to focus on a task and not worry about what else is going on,” said Ott. “Just focus on getting the job done in spite of everything else.”