Montco police officer delivers baby

Matt Cubbler has had a pretty exciting career as a U.S. Federal Air Marshall, Army Persian Gulf War veteran and SWAT team member.

But the 41-year-old Collegeville police officer was not prepared for the call that came at the end of his overnight shift on Thursday.

Cubbler just turned off his computer around 6:30 a.m. in his police car when a 911 dispatch directed him to respond to the parking lot of a TD Bank on 2nd Avenue for a woman in labor.

When Cubbler arrived, the woman, who police are not identifying, was moments away from giving birth. Her daughter, 4, and a son, 6, were buckled up in their child seats in the back of the car.

Cubbler acted quickly to move the children into the back of his police car and promised them he would take good care of their mother. He could hear the sirens of the approaching ambulances.

He retuned to the car to see the baby's head crowning and knelt beside the woman.

"Look at me," Cubbler said. "I am not the face of the man you want to deliver your child."

"You are all I've got," he was told.

Then she pushed.

The father of two, who described himself as a "great backrubber and hand holder," but not someone who wanted to do more in the delivery room, suddenly found himself holding the baby's head and then it's shoulders.

Cubbler yelled for the Trappe Ambulance paramedics who had just pulled into the parking lot to hurry over.

Paramedics Matt Byrd and Clint Tichnell arrived at his side just in time. With another big push, the 7-pound, 7-ounce baby boy was born two week early, Cubbler said. Moments later fire Chief Paul Giannini, a emergency delivery veteran, arrived to help cut the cord and finish the delivery.

The woman, who was in labor only a short time, was transported to Pottstown Hospital.

Cubbler, who called the experience both "cool" and "intense" followed up with a phone call to find out both Mom and baby were doing fine.

"It was the gentlemanly thing to do," he said.

Contact staff writer Mari A. Schaefer at 610-892-9149, mschaefer@phillynews.com or @MariSchaefer on Twitter.