Highway Angels

Driver administers CPR to save heart attack victim

Michael Taylor, a professional driver for FTC Transportation, Inc. of Oklahoma City, OK, has been named a Truckload Carriers Association (TCA) Highway Angel for helping a man survive a medical emergency.
     On Dec. 21, 2008, Taylor was driving from Atlanta to Nashville and had stopped at Patty’s Truck Stop in Adairsville, GA, to get lunch before getting back on the road. While he was there, a shivering man came in to get something to eat and warm up from the 14-degree temperature outside.
     Taylor and the man chatted briefly. After the conversation, the man moved to another table, but soon started breathing hard and leaning over. He fumbled in his pocket, found something small and put it in his mouth. Taylor, whose grandfather had suffered from a heart condition, realized that the man was doing something he had seen his grandfather do many times: swallow a nitroglycerin pill.
     At first, the man started to relax, and Taylor thought the pill had worked. But suddenly, he clutched his chest and fell to the floor. Taylor shouted to the fuel desk attendant to call for an ambulance. Taylor, who used to be assistant chief of a rescue squad, began talking to the man, patting his cheeks and searching for a pulse. There was none.
     A truck stop employee named Blanche came to assist Taylor. Together, they began administering cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). Blanche performed the chest compressions, while Taylor gave artificial respiration. The man had no pulse and was not breathing, but after a minute of CPR, he revived momentarily. He then stopped breathing a second time, and Taylor and Blanche again gave CPR and revived him.
     By the time the paramedics arrived, the man was revived enough to talk weakly. As emergency personnel rushed him out of the truck stop to begin transporting him to the hospital, Taylor and the truck stop employees remained together for a moment in the now silent room, contemplating the enormity of what had just happened.
     “All of a sudden, Blanche and the others started hugging my neck and thanking me over and over,” said Taylor. “I was just doing what anybody would do.”

     For helping save the man’s life, Taylor received a Highway Angel lapel pin, certificate and patch. FTC Transportation, Inc. also received a certificate acknowledging that one of its drivers is a Highway Angel.