Where: Hillsborough County Medical Examiner's office, 401 S. Morgan St., Tampa
Public access: Rare. That TV thing where people "come down and identify the body" doesn't happen, at least not in Hillsborough. When, in rare cases, an acquaintance or family member needs to I.D. a corpse, it's done with photographs. There are no public tours of the ME facility.
Element of danger: None, really. If you come in on a gurney, any danger is pretty much moot. If you come in under your own power, the staff here is really nice, and sharp objects are well concealed.
Why we went: 'Cause many of us will end up there someday, or someplace like it.
What we discovered: So, you're dead. Killed in a bizarre hunting accident in South Tampa. What happens to you now (corporeally speaking)?
A transport service comes by and loads you into a plain white ambulance-type vehicle, then drives you to the Hillsborough County Medical Examiner's office, a squat, nondescript building around the corner from the St. Pete Times Forum. This is where the county brings anyone who's experienced a violent, sudden, unexpected or unattended death. If Grandma passes away peacefully in her bed surrounded by loved ones, chances are she'll go directly to a funeral home.
At the garage-like loading dock in the back, they roll you up an incline, and at the top of the ramp an autopsy technician will photograph, X-ray and fingerprint you, among other stuff. Then they wheel you into the morgue, a cramped room that's kept between 37 and 40 degrees, with a low ceiling, gray metal walls and harsh, fluorescent lights. You'll join the up to 40 bodies housed here, be fitted with a body bag and toe tag. All that will be visible are your feet sticking out of the bag. And unlike what you've seen on TV, you won't be stored in a drawer; you stay on your gurney. Stacked on nearby shelves are unidentified skeletal remains (in boxes) and tissue samples (in Tupperware-like containers).
The Medical Examiner's staff will quickly determine whether you require an autopsy. If you croak from obvious natural causes, have an adequate medical history and there are no signs of foul play, you probably won't be opened up. But because you bought it in a hunting accident, you can bet a doc'll be slicing, baby.
The autopsy will probably be performed within a day, and take about 90 minutes. A pathologist will examine all of your major organs — he will remove the top of your head — and a toxicologist will do a battery of tests.
Then they wheel you back into the morgue, where you await transport to a funeral home. The pathologist issues a cause of death (in your case, trauma due to buckshot in the brain), and a death certificate.
They'll roll you down the same ramp you arrived on, load you into a funeral home vehicle and off ya go.
This article appears in Mar 1-7, 2006.
