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Dixie Crichton gets visit by North Highline Fire District Chief Scott LaVielle
The call came on a Friday morning. Unconscious man, age 58, fell in the kitchen. The dispatcher had trouble hearing over panicked family.
North Highline Fire District Chief Scott LaVielle jumped in an engine and went with crews to Crichton’s home, less than a block past the South Seattle border.
The former math professor was taking only three short, labored breaths per minute, firefighters said.
His wife was crying. Some of his children went downstairs, afraid of what would happen.
“Basically,” LaVielle said, “he was shutting down.”
“The kitchen was cramped, and it wasn’t the perfect situation, but you don’t think about that,” said firefighter Chris Johnson, who performed CPR that day. “You get tired, then you think, ‘This is somebody’s life.’ ”
Rescuers took turns at CPR until their arms burned.
“I kept thinking to myself that we as a team controlled the future of this family,” LaVielle said.
After an hour and 19 minutes — and the 11th shock to his heart — one of the firefighters walked toward Dixie Crichton’s wife to say he was gone.
Then another yelled: “We’ve got a heart rate!”
“When his heart stopped, we didn’t think he was going to come back,” said Crichton’s 16-year- old daughter, Karen. “I was scared. I didn’t know what to do.”
The heartbeat stayed constant. Firefighters, wearing gear soaked in sweat, saw the family’s fear shift to hope as Crichton was rushed to a hospital.
When Crichton was reunited with the fire chief earlier this month, his face lit up as if he were a kid opening presents, and Crichton wrapped the chief in a hug. Both men fought back tears.
Crichton, still touching the chief’s arm, tried to express in words what he was feeling. Itagia Crichton explained that her husband didn’t speak much English.
He didn’t need to use words, the chief said. The hug said it all.
