Three agencies come together to celebrate the quick-thinking actions that brought a Police Officer back from the brink.
A regular weekend visit to a beachside café for David took a dramatic turn when he suddenly found himself playing a key role in efforts to save a man's life.
The Corrective Services Officer was among the first to the scene after an off-duty Police Officer collapsed behind a vehicle in the car park at Burns Beach in Perth's north.
"I'd seen the gentleman had had what looked like a fall, initially," David said. "But I'd gone over to check and it turned out that he was actually in cardiac arrest.
"I couldn't find a pulse at the time," he said. "There was nothing happening in the heart. It had stopped beating."
But the 41-year-old victim was fortunate that David, a former paramedic, and other passersby with first aid experience happened to be in the vicinity.
While they carried out chest compressions, café manager Tara - acting on advice from the triple-zero dispatcher - rushed to the nearby caravan park to fetch an automated external defibrillator.
"I must have looked like a mad woman, because I just absolutely bolted up the road and then through the café," Tara said. "It felt like a lifetime, but I've honestly never run that quick in my life."
David said the victim was given two shocks with the defibrillator, in between compressions.
When a St John WA ambulance arrived, the paramedics assessed that the bystanders' resuscitation efforts had given the Police Officer a chance of survival.
"They'd done the hard work for us," Ambulance Paramedic Bridgette said. "We just took over to establish an airway and get some air flow happening, along with some advanced life support procedures.
"And then he was back with a pulse and some of his own effort of breathing after about 10 minutes," she said.
After the Police Officer was taken to hospital, David wasn't confident about his condition. "I actually didn't think that he was going to make it," he said. "He was really gravely ill."
After some anxious days trying to find out what had happened, David was exhilarated to learn the man had lived.
"He was up and around. He was talking. He was walking." A hospital visit was arranged. "When I got there, it was really emotional for me."
About six weeks later, the Police Officer - who has no recollection of the day of his collapse - had a reunion with some of his rescuers at the café where it all went down.
"It's very heartwarming to catch up with the people who saved my life," he said. "I've always been on the other end of the spectrum. But being the receiver is a different feeling, humbling."
"I couldn't have asked for most perfect timing for everything and anything to happen for me (and) to be able to stand here and have a conversation with you right now."
The officer is recuperating at home and hoping to return to work soon.
The ambulance officers said the episode was one of those unfortunately rare occasions when a person survives what is known as an OHCA - out-of-hospital cardiac arrest.
"We had people who knew how to do CPR, how to do it effectively and that a defib was available for them to get," Ambulance Paramedic Zoe said. "And they knew what to do and how to use it."
Bridgette said: "It's the difference between life and death in those first five minutes."
David said the whole episode gave him the opportunity to reflect on his training and the work frontline officers do in Corrective Services.
"We don't step back when there's an emergency, we step forward."
