TSA Officer Hailed Hero For Reviving Passenger Who Suffered Heart Attack At BWI
LINTHICUM, Md. (WJZ) -- A Transportation Security Administration officer (TSA) is being hailed as a hero after reviving a passenger who collapsed after suffering a heart attack inside an airport restaurant.
Meghan McCorkell reports for WJZ.
Supervisory TSA Officer Jonas Cohen was working at Baltimore Washington International-Thurgood Marshall Airport when he was approached by a restaurant employee who said a man was ill and needed help.
Cohen, also a former member of the U.S. Coast Guard and a trained EMT from Laurel, rushed over and found a man slumped over a metal barrier that surrounded the restaurant.
It was supposed just be a normal work day for TSA officer Cohen.
"You're used to everyday passengers coming through, processing, and keeping the traveling public safe," Cohen said.
But last Thursday was anything but routine.
When he rushed to the scene, he found the pale 67-year-old man on the floor with blue lips and eyes rolled back.
He then helped lay the traveler, who had stopped breathing, flat on the floor then raced to get an AED.
He said his training just "kicked in."
Cohen started working with a passenger who identified herself as a doctor and another passenger who was an off-duty firefighter.
Cohen began chest compressions and was instruction by the AED to apply shocks to the man's chest. The man's heart began to beat and a pulse was detected. Fire department personnel took over the man's care.
The team worked for eight minutes until paramedics arrived and eventually got the patient's heart beating again.
"He had a heart rate on his way into the ambulance," Cohen recalled. At that point he went over to the fallen man's wife to help console her. "She was crying in disbelief. I advised her that her husband was receiving good care. Airport police told me a couple days later that the man was alive although he was still in intensive care."
A 13-year-veteran of the TSA, Cohen also once performer CPR on a passenger that collapsed at the Fort Lauderdale International Airport in 2005.
"When something like that happens right there in front of you, you resort back to your training and automatically know what to do, " he said. "People can say what they want about TSA officers, but we know that when something happens, the public looks to us to come help, and that's what we do. That's what I did."
The traveler was healthy enough to return home from the hospital the following week.
"Officer Cohen's quick actions were heroic," said TSA Federal Security Director Andrea R. Mishoe. "We are fortunate to have him on our team. There is no doubt that his quick response improved the traveler's probability of surviving."
Even so, Cohen is reluctant to consider himself a hero.
"That's the most rewarding," said Cohen, after saying he was just relieved the man is OK. "No monetary or certificate saying thank you – the biggest thing is his survival."