MIAMI (WSVN) - A Miami Fire Rescue employee is being honored by the Miami City Commission for saving a coworker’s life at her second job.
Brittney McDuffie works full-time by day as a supply clerk at the fire department and by night at a FedEx facility in Doral.
McDuffie was sorting packages late one night in May when her coworker, Javier Belisario, collapsed and stopped breathing.
“We were in the warehouse working, and suddenly I felt a little dizzy for a second,” said Belisario, “and that is the last thing I remember.”
“A guy screamed out someone went down,” added McDuffie. “I saw Javi laying on the floor non-responsive, had no pulse or anything, [so] I started doing CPR right away.”
Luckily, McDuffie had taken a CPR course with the fire department weeks earlier, so she was able to get Belisario breathing again with what she had learned.
“I was like, ‘Oh, my God. Thank you, Jesus. He is here. He is alive,'” said McDuffie.
“She is not just a hero. She is an angel. She is my angel,” added Belisario. “She saved my life, and there are no words I can say to thank her for that.”
McDuffie is a civilian and not a firefighter, but if she hadn’t taken the voluntary CPR course, she wouldn’t have been able to save her coworker’s life.
Miami Fire Rescue Chief Joseph Zahralban recognized that and is now requiring all fire rescue employees to learn how to perform CPR.
“You don’t have to be a firefighter to save a life,” said Zahralban. “Anybody who takes this training and can get to the victim early enough can make a difference.”
Zahralban encourages everyone to take a CPR class because you never know when you’ll need to use it.
The city is starting their mandatory CPR training in the coming weeks.
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