Nadir Habib suffered a heart attack on December 17th at the Soccer Dome in northwest Calgary. As the moments ticked by, anxiously waiting for EMS, it was other players trained in CPR who kept him alive.
Nadir Habib has spent the last few weeks meeting all the men who helped save his life, players from a number of teams, coaches, and a referee.
He just met Kevin Francis, a constable with the Calgary Police Service, who was off duty at the time, and had just finished playing soccer. Francis was one of several players who gave Habib CPR, and in the process broke his ribs!
Habib is philosophical about the broken ribs "I understand that's common, it shows they did an excellent job, that's truly giving CPR".
Francis says it was the first time he's used his CPR training and adds "there's a couple of seconds of realization that it is not a training scenario, this is happening, you suddenly come out of yourself and a voice is saying what you should be doing".
Habib doesn't remember much of the night, he says he just remembers walking into the Soccer Dome, and then he woke up in the hospital.
His teammate Ashif Jinnah recalls how it all happened, "he just clutched on to one of the players on the opposite team and suggested he wasn't feeling well. Nadir then fell back and collapsed". That's when everyone sprang into action, calling 911 and starting CPR.
Richard Li, a referee, says he had completed his CPR training just ten months prior, "I'm so glad I learned this program and saved a life, it's great, I feel great".
Habib says "they saved my life as a team".
Coincidentally, only a week before suffering his own heart attack, Habib, who was out for dinner with his soccer team, witnessed another man having a heart attack. It was Habib who jumped in that time and gave CPR to the man; a man he calls his Guardian Angel. That's because Habib believes that experience helped his teammates recognize when he was having a heart attack and which is why they were able to react so quickly.
