A Brown County dispatcher has received an award for helping a De Pere couple get through a frightening emergency.
Heidi Hamm went into labor and quickly realized she couldn't make it in time to the hospital.
"My wife is having a baby," Mike said on the 911 call. "Oh my God. The head is coming out."
He sounded calm, but on the inside, he was terrified.
"Complete panic, because you're not prepared for this situation at all."
Amber Castro was prepared. Through her training as a dispatcher, she was able to talk the nervous parents through the process of delivering their baby girl.
"It was very reassuring and comforting to know that there was somebody on the other end of that line that had the instructions for us," explained Heidi.
"We deal with such bad calls, so to have a good call come in and hear the first breath of a new baby is just amazing," said Castro.
Baby Kinley is now 13-months-old, and she just met Castro for the first time.
"When the call came in, I had no idea if it was a boy or a girl and that's all stuff we want to know. What's her name? Just exciting stuff, so it's good to be able to see her face," Castro said.
Kinley, her older sister and parents were all by Castro's side Wednesday night as she was honored for a job well done. Castro received an award from Brown County for her exceptional work in bringing Kinley safely into the world.
"You don't think you're going to wake up and have a baby within seven minutes, so just the fact that there's support there, someone that can help walk you through it, it's incredibly important," said Mike.
Castro received the recognition as part of National Public Safety Telecommunicators Week.
