CHENEY, Wash. — An Eastern Washington University soccer player is credited with helping save the life of a fellow passenger during a flight last week.
Ashley Valdivieso, a freshman defender, was en route with fellow teammates to the Big Sky women's soccer tournament on the morning of Monday, Oct.29. The team was flying from Spokane to Denver before continuing to the competition in Utah.
Valdivieso was napping when she recalls being jolted awake by a shouting woman nearby. "The woman in the row next to me started screaming,” Valdivieso said. “She was screaming, 'Please help, someone help. My husband doesn't have a pulse.'"
The incident occurred as the plane was preparing to land. Valdiveso said that flight attendants and others started to panic in the heat of the moment. The attendants then began asking if any of the passengers knew CPR.
The passenger in distress would be in luck. Valdivieso, who was not only sitting nearby, knew CPR from her time working as a nanny back home in Arizona. Valdivieso took a CPR certification class as part of her job.
Thinking fast, Valdivieso assisted in laying the passenger on his pack in the aisle before starting CPR. After only two chest compressions, the man woke up.
"He came to, and was trying to sit up,” said Valdivieso, who admitted to being surprised in the moment. "It definitely woke me up."
As the incident played out, the pilots on the flights sped up the landing process, Valdivieso said. Paramedics waiting at the airport then assisted the man in getting off the flight. Valdivieso wasn’t able to follow up with the passenger or his husband, but medical staff at the airport told her the man appeared to be doing well after the incident.
"I'm pretty proud of myself for stepping up. Because you never know, in that kind of situation, how you're going to react,” she said.