A quick-thinking team of firefighters hope they saved an old man’s life after his desperate family knocked on the door of their fire station.

The firefighters from New Addington’s green-watch are still waiting to hear whether or not the gentleman they helped has recovered or not.

The 76-year-old man, who was in cardiac arrest, was being taken to hospital by his family after they were told it would be quicker to drive him themselves rather than wait for an ambulance.

But his conditioned worsened and he stopped breathing. The family pulled over at New Addington Fire Station, in Lodge Lane, at 2.50am on Wednesday morning.

The station’s green-watch, who were on duty, pulled the gentleman out of the car and laid him down so they could open his airways.

They pushed down on his chest once and he started breathing again although it was very faint and he had a weak pulse.

He was then given oxygen until the London Ambulance Service arrived who then took him to Croydon University Hospital in a serious condition.

There were six firefighters who helped in total, including watch manager Tony Sullivan, Ryan Palmer, Glenn Higgins, Jane Sharp, Al Lewis, Neil Batcheler and Peter Forster.

Ryan Palmer, 27, who has been a firefighter for two years, said he hopes the gentleman is ok and that their quick thinking helped saved his life.

He said: "The family were understandably quite hysterical. We checked his vitals and made sure he was breathing.

"When we had the knock at the window we didn’t know what was going as the family were fearing the worst but in the job we have to think fast and we just helped without thinking, it was instinct.

"We kept the man alive and kept him breathing. It is not uncommon to get a knock at the door but this one was pretty dramatic.

"It was a good thing they knocked on the door as he was not in a good way. It would be good to know how he is as we potentially saved his life."

A spokeswoman for the London Ambulance Service said through starting chest compressions immediately they gave the patient the best chance of survival.

 

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