Barney, 58, a technician with the city of Reno’s public works department since 1999, was cutting roots for a project off of Robb Drive last week while the contractors with the concrete company were working nearby.

“Alan was bent down, he was sawing on a root and told our guys that ‘I’m getting too old for this,’” said Mike Popejoy, the owner of Reno Concrete, on Tuesday. “Then, he just passed out and fell backward.”

That’s when Raul Castillo, Bill Nagel and Jose Garcia started CPR and got one of the defibrillators stashed away in one of their work trucks. First responders arrived about a minute later, Popejoy said.

“I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for them,” Barney said from his hospital room. “Their guys showed up and saved my cookies.”

It wasn’t the first time Reno Concrete had faced a life-threatening situation. One of their employees suffered a heart attack three years ago, resulting in the company buying the defibrillators and training everyone how to use them, Popejoy said.

“You don’t think you’re ever going to use it,” he said. “But it was sure nice to have.”

After the heart attack, Barney woke up a couple of days later with tubes running into his body while his two sons, Justin, 18, and Ryan, 21, stayed by his side.

Barney had triple bypass surgery Saturday but was hoping to leave the hospital by Wednesday. And while he’s not sure about Thanksgiving dinner on Thursday, his sons said they’ll likely delay their holiday dinner by a couple weeks to let their father recuperate.

Barney said he’s now thinking about retirement after nearly 33 years of public service, including jobs in Lassen County, Calif., and with the U.S. Bureau of Land Management.

And as families sit down around table to say what they’re thankful for this week, Justin Barney said that’s an easy question to answer: The men and the machine that helped save his father’s life.

“I think Reno should increase more of the defibrillators in the contractor trucks,” he said. “Because if it wasn’t there, he wouldn’t be here right now.”

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Nothing big, they just saved his life is all.

Porter, 55, was at work in the mill’s control room July 6 when he suffered a sudden cardiac arrest. He doesn’t remember the heart attack, but he remembers waking up in the hospital and being told that his co-workers had saved his life using their training and an automatic external defibrillator.

“I’ll never look at these guys the same way again,” Porter said.

The saviours included Tiffany Johnson, Nevada Torrence, Cathy Baker, Steve Blank, Tim Morris, Steve Ratte, Lonnie Simonson, Richard Swanson, Bryan Blazejak, Jay Pederson and Matt King.

When talking through the incident, the operator called for the Newport Automatic External Defibrillator (AED) unit – a portable electronic device that automatically diagnoses the potentially life threatening cardiac arrhythmias – to be used.

NBA founder Jeremy Rose rushed to his car and drove to the unit situated by The Pharmacy in High Street, which was installed last year.

“I must admit I was a little stressed to get the unit out in time,” said Mr Rose, who has been trained. “I keyed in the code, which I always keep on my mobile phone, grabbed the unit and rushed back to the station platform in under five minutes.

“The man had been convulsing and having tachycardiac spasms, so deploying the AED unit was deemed vital.

“Just knowing that the unit was ready was reassuring. We were on hand, the unit was ready and used within five minutes.”

Emergency services responded quickly, with the ambulance arriving within nine minutes of the call going out.

“As anyone knows, if you have heart failure, you need to revive the heart within an eight minute window of opportunity, otherwise a person can die or receive severe brain damage,” explained Mr Rose.

“We’ve trained a seven-year-old and an 87 year-old resident to use the defibrillator. Anyone can use the unit. The fact that we got there within five minutes is hugely gratifying.”

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Back in May, one of the employees at ECR International suffered a heart attack in the Customer Service Department. A signal code red alerted other employees in the building who are trained as first responders and the employee’s pulse was restored with an automated external defibrillator.

Director of Human Resources Johnita DeMatteo says the incident was life changing for all involved.

“I was really very concerned about the employee, hoping that he was going to be okay,” DeMatteo said. “I just did what I had to do. I really didn’t think about it. Your adrenaline kicks in and you just do what you have to do.”

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Seconds after a heat of the decathlons’ 400 meters, Schmidt, the director of Mississippi State University track and field, felt dizzy. A shortness of breath followed.

Al Schmidt the Survivor

Still struggling to breathe, he scanned Spec Towns Track in Athens Ga., for MSU track coaches Steve Dudley and Houston Franks then walked toward them, holding a copper container with glycerine pills. He reached for Dudley where he collapsed, falling into Dudley’s arms, the beginning of his latest fight for his life.

Time, which track coaches constantly monitor, was in short supply.

By the time Dudley took the top off the pill bottle, Schmidt’s jaw had locked. So he rubbed the medicine on his gum line to get it in his bloodstream. It had no effect.

Scar tissue from a triple bypass surgery was causing an arrhythmia — an irregular heart beat — disrupting his heart’s normal functions, blocking blood from traveling throughout his body.

If not corrected, Schmidt’s heart would stop. His skin started to turn blue.

“I checked his pulse,” Dudley remembered. “It was a light pulse but not a good pulse.”

Shocked, athletes surrounded Schmidt. Dudley yelled for an ambulance and medical assistance. Dr. Donald Lazas, the father of a runner from the University of Arkansas, ran from his seat in the stands and performed CPR. Ron Courson, an athletic trainer at the University of Georgia, retrieved the on-site automated external defibrillator (AED).

Schmidt’s pulse returned after the defibrillator’s first administration, then faded. He flat-lined.

It was administered again. This time, his pulse returned and settled, allowing Schmidt’s heart to re-establish an effective rhythm.

Emergency medical support was still en route, but the entrance gate was closed. MSU freshman James Harris ran toward the gate and pushed it open as the ambulance arrived, saving four to five minutes it would have taken EMS personnel to enter the track through a different gate. With cardiac arrest, four to five minutes is long enough to suffer brain damage.

Schmidt, already the survivor of a heart attack in 1998, was now stable and communicating with EMS personnel. He was transported to Athens Regional Medical Center, where he received cardiac catheterization.

Before leaving Athens, Schmidt endured two surgeries — a second bypass surgery and a pacemaker and internal defibrillator installation.

Six weeks later, when MSU introduced new softball coach Vann Stuedeman, most of MSU’s coaches were on hand to welcome her.

Schmidt was there, too, showing no physical effects of open heart surgery. In fact, he told MSU Director of Athletics Scott Stricklin he walked two miles that day.

“To see him not just doing better but feeling good enough to come into work is great,” Stricklin said.

Though he can’t recall the length of time that passed while he was in cardiac arrest, Schmidt understands the mechanics of what happened.

“It couldn’t have happened in a better place,” said Schmidt, who said later learned Athens Regional Medical Center is the top cardiac facility in the area. “If this would have happened at the hotel or someplace else, I would have been a goner.”

Today, the only difference in his life is that he doesn’t run and feels minor chest pain near the surgical incision.

He walks with his wife, Jessie, in Humphrey Coliseum to maintain his cardiovascular regimen.

He doesn’t enjoy walking; he’s a runner, accustomed to logging four to five miles at a time. To Schmidt, walking takes more physical effort than running. After all, he has run 84,000 miles since he started keeping a log during his freshman year of high school, dating back 44 years.

As mundane as walking is, it’ll have to do for now.

“We did two-and-a-half miles yesterday and the pain he’s still experiencing in his chest is probably because it’s still inflamed,” Jessie said. “I think once that subsides to a level where he can accommodate it he’ll get back to running.”

His pacemaker is set for a heart rate of 200, so doctors are comfortable he can return to running full time. The defibrillator in his chest will provide the electrical jolt needed if he goes into cardiac arrest again.

“They say it’ll feel like a mule kicked me in the chest,” Schmidt said.

The contractor, 24-year-old Zaed Quituqa of Haledon, was listed in critical condition at Capital Health Regional Medical Center in Trenton this evening, he said.

Cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) initiated by Quituqa’s coworkers and continued by Officer Shawn Carroll and Sgt. Michael Yeh, along with the use by the police officers of an automated external defibrillator (AED), was credited with saving Quituqa’s life, Edgar said.

Standing on the elevated platform of a scissor-type lift, Quituqa and a coworker from I & T Electrical Lighting of Paterson were working on overhead lights in the public works garage in the 200 block Bakers Basin Road when the accident happened about 3:15 p.m., Edgar said.

Police are still investigating exactly what happened, he said, but somehow Quituqa came in contact with electricity.

When his coworker realized Quituqa was being shocked, the coworker used his foot to kick Quituqa clear of the lighting and anything else he might have been touching, such as the metal rails for one of the garage’s overhead doors, according to Edgar. The coworker was not hurt, he said.

The coworker quickly lowered the lift and he and others moved Quituqa from the lift to the floor. He was not breathing and had no pulse at that time, Edgar said.

While a public works employee dialed 911 to request assistance, he said, Quituqa’s coworkers started CPR.

Carroll and Yeh soon arrived. Confirming that Quituqa was in cardiac arrest, they connected a defibrillator to Quituqa and delivered an electrical pulse to his body in the hope the targeted shock would jumpstart his heart into beating correctly again, Edgar said. After the delivering the shock, Carroll and Yeh resumed CPR.

After about two minutes of them performing CPR, Quituqa’s heart began beating again and he started to breathe, he said.

Lawrence Township Emergency Medical Service personnel and paramedics from Capital Health System then arrived to take over patient care. They quickly bundled Quituqa into an ambulance and rushed him to the hospital in Trenton.

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The Invercargill Licensing Trust recently granted more than $4000 to buy its 57th defibrillator for the region – Mr Morrison’s life was saved by one of the first.

Russell Morrison the Survivor

In early 2008 the defibrillator was donated to the Georgetown Bowling Club. Three weeks later Mr Morrison, then 65 and working as the club’s greenkeeper, collapsed.

He was preparing the green for an upcoming tournament when he stopped breathing, he said yesterday.

“I was told that the mower took off, ending up in a ditch, and I landed on the green.”

Two first-year bowlers assisted. One started CPR while the other rushed for his cellphone to call an ambulance.

Another club member and trained defibrillator operator who happened to be driving past was flagged down and he began attempting to restart Mr Morrison’s heart.

“I’m told I leapt 75mm off the ground,” he said.

The ambulance quickly arrived, paramedics took over and he was resuscitated another three times.

He was taken to Southland Hospital and his daughter Pam Wilson and her two brothers were told the news was grim.

“I got a call to say Dad had collapsed and it wasn’t looking good. I was told there was no hope. I didn’t think he would survive,” Mrs Wilson said yesterday.

Mr Morrison was incoherent and does not remember the next few days.

“There was not much that could be done for me and virtually, I was in a room to die.”

But the defibrillator proved its worth and left doctors in awe of Mr Morrison’s recovery.

He was taken through to Dunedin for an angiogram and it was found a blood clot was the cause. He also had 90 per cent of three parts of his arteries blocked.

Mr Morrison said he appreciated everyone’s contribution and the defibrillator.

“When I look back I have enjoyed the past few years and look forward to many more. The defibrillator saved my life.”

Meghan Pituch, 26, a graphic artist and analyst who’s worked at the Montreal-based IT company for four years, jumped out of her seat and ran toward the commotion. She found her colleague, 62-year-old Bruce Strissel, slumped over in his chair. Some coworkers froze in fear while others ran to dial 911 or fled in search of help.

Pituch got moving, too – toward Strissel. She and Donna Jordan, a colleague who works for BAE Systems, performed CPR on the government worker while another colleague Barbara Gault, who is certified in CPR, supervised them until the paramedics arrived. Because of their quick thinking and swift action, Strissel is alive and well today.

To recognize their efforts, the American Heart Association (AHA); the DC City Council; and DC Fire and Emergency Medical Services honored the three women as Heartsaver Heroes at a ceremony at the City Council steps on June 2. Part of National CPR Week, they each received a framed award certificate and a letter of recognition from DC Councilmember Harry Thomas Jr.

“Even though Meghan was not certified in CPR at the time, she, Barbara and Donna demonstrated that being active responders saves lives,” said Cheryl Campbell, senior vice president at CGI and a member of AHA’s Mid-Atlantic Affiliate Board of Directors. “This shows you simply cannot be a passive bystander in times of an emergency medical crisis.”

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Lloyd Clausen, 57, a contract manager for lines company Orion, suffered a cardiac arrest while at work on March 31, but was revived by CPR-trained workmates. He was with a colleague in the cafeteria when he lost consciousness.

Lloyd Clausen the Survivor

“Apparently my eyes rolled back and I just collapsed on the floor,” he said.

“[The colleague] tried the pericardial thump, which is the big `boomph’ on the chest, and that didn’t do anything. He yelled at the top of his voice, and that brought people running.”

More Orion staff arrived with the company’s defibrillator that Clausen had lobbied for, while others continued CPR. A single electrical charge restarted Clausen’s heart before he was rushed to hospital for surgery.

Doctors told him his condition had only a 2 per cent survival rate.

A defibrillator at Christchurch International Airport prompted Clausen’s push to have one at Orion. The resuscitation was a “team effort”.

“Someone didn’t want me to die,” he said. “I don’t think the guys see themselves as heroes, but I’m grateful. How do you thank people like that?”

Clausen said he “probably wouldn’t be here” had he been anywhere else at the time

“Luckily for me, we had the machine there, we had the people there trained to use it, and also people with CPR training.”

Electrical workers receive emergency training as part of their registration.

Clausen, a volunteer firefighter in Leeston, said he had experience as a rescuer and knew his workmates were scared.

“I’ve done [CPR] on people I don’t know and I’ve done it on people I do know, so I know the pressure’s on when it’s someone you know,” he said.

Greg Birely & Joe Chavira the Saviours

When he arrived, he found a male on the floor; no pulse could be detected.

He applied the defibrillator patches to the man’s body and with the assistance of Detective Birely, delivered three shocks to the man’s system and performed CPR until paramedics arrived.

Birely was then asked to drive the ambulance to the hospital.

“Because of their quick response, critical thinking and strong desire to provide the best possible service to the Delta community, I would like to present to Sgt. Chavira and Det. Birely the Lifesaving Award,” Thomas said. Mayor Mary Cooper enthusiastically led a round of applause. The former owner of Delta Motor Parts, she said the man who suffered the heart attack was “a very dear friend and an employee of almost 20 years.”

Humbled by the award, Sgt. Chavira said he was thankful God put him in a situation to help. Detective Birely said it’s an honor for them both to serve the citizens of Delta. They don’t do the job for recognition, but do appreciate the award. “Thankfully we were able to help the gentleman,” Birely said.