Winnipeg man waits 11 hours for an ambulance after breaking his hip

A Winnipeg man is sharing his story of waiting 11 hours for an ambulance after slipping and injuring himself outside. Harrison Shin reports.

Spending both Christmas and New Year’s Eve in a hospital bed was not part of Ken MacKinnon’s holiday plans.

MacKinnon says at around 9:50 a.m. on Dec. 20, 2025, he was walking to his car on his street in Wolseley. He slipped on ice, tried to get up, but he couldn’t, lying in the roadway.

A few minutes later, his neighbours Craig Wallace and Kristie Allen-Wallace saw MacKinnon from their window.

“I then ran outside—got my jacket on … By that time, there was a second person with him to assess the situation,” Craig Wallace told CTV News on Dec. 21, 2025. “He said he thinks he broke his hip, and so the three of us managed to move him into his house.”

MacKinnon said his wife, Vera, called an ambulance right after, but the first responders did not come to his house until 9 p.m. that day, 11 hours later.

“I was just breathing through the pain. I was taking Tylenol and ibuprofen, and nothing was helping. I basically just couldn’t move.

“Like—if I moved even slightly—a millimeter—I would be in shock, shocking pain.”

MacKinnon said he was transported to Grace Hospital, where he received surgery for a fractured hip and discharged on New Year’s Day.

In an email to CTV News, a spokesperson for the city said it cannot provide specific details on this case, due to privacy reasons. However, the spokesperson confirmed there was a staffing shortage that day.

“On December 20, 2025, we experienced staffing shortages. We had 16 of 19 ambulances staffed for the day shift and 14 of 19 ambulances staffed for the night shift,” the spokesperson said. Eight of the 11 ambulances were staffed, planned for staggered-start shifts, according to the spokesperson.

The city noted a triage system is used by dispatchers, prioritizing calls by symptom and “which emergency crews we have available at any given time.

“While we strive to respond as quickly as possible, some patients may experience longer wait times – similar to what can occur in an emergency department.

“In certain cases, a WFPS advanced care paramedic may assess a patient over the phone while awaiting an available ambulance.”

‘Who knows how much it can make your injury worse’

MacKinnon is calling for a system to deal with lengthy wait times.

“There has to be a system in place that after a certain point of length, you really need to be picked up because that’s detrimental to your mental health, and who knows how much it can make your injury worse,” he said.

“I don’t know if it made mine worse or not. But it was just pain I had to deal with. I think, for the most part, this has to be fixed somehow.”

Water main break

MacKinnon said a huge implication of his fall was a water main break on Dec. 6, 2025.

“It was trickling from the ground at the corner, which is about four or five houses up from where my car was, and I saw a city staff (member) come and look at it, and I thought, ‘Well, he must be coming to fix it.’

“But no, they just let it run all night. And by morning, my car was trapped in ice, the whole street was a river, and the water main break ran on for another two days. They didn’t shut off the water at all.”

He said the city fixed it on Monday, but he had to call a tow truck to pull his vehicle out from “just about four inches into the ice.”

After his vehicle was pulled out from the ice, the city graded the street but still “left a thick layer of ice on the street and the grading just kind of created a nice, polished surface,” MacKinnon said.

“It was almost like a skating rink, and they didn’t put sand down after. So when I was walking to my car, I was walking on that skating rink, and that’s how I slipped.”

The city spokesperson confirmed the water services attended a water leak on a water service pipe to a property on that day.

“Water Services crews worked to direct the flow of water to the street to drain to catch basin until a repair could be completed,” the spokesperson said.

“The repair of the water service pipe was completed on Dec. 8, 2025. Water Services staff checked the area on Dec. 10, 2025 to confirm the condition of the street was safe and noted some ice buildup on the sidewalk.”

The spokesperson said arrangements were made to sand the sidewalk.