'Miracle in the sky': Passengers' life-saving act

A man was found unresponsive on board a Spirit Airlines flight from Detroit to Orlando on Tuesday. Photo / 123rf

A man was brought back to life on board a Spirit Airlines flight to Orlando, thanks to the help of two nurses and a man who had just taken a CPR class.

Passenger Jeff Kruger had been sitting behind the man on the Spirit Airlines Flight 801 from Detroit Metro Airport Tuesday, when he noticed the man wasn't moving.

"He was completely unresponsive, head tilted, jaw open, not breathing properly," Kruger said to News 6. "You could just tell something was wrong."

Katherine Yombik, a nurse from Michigan, was waiting for the flight to take off when she heard someone ask for help, the Daily Mail reported.

"Someone said "call 911" and we went back and the guy is unresponsive and (had) no pulse so we pulled him out and started CPR," Yombik said.

Kruger lifted the man up, having just finished a CPR course two weeks prior.

"Someone picked him up from that side, someone picked him up from the feet, got him from his seat to the ground," Kruger added.

"As I went to start compressions there's an EMT, yelling, who came forward, so my response was to get a defibrillator to the gentlemen as quickly as possible."

The nurse from Michigan said she performed CPR on the man, who has not been identified.

"No pulse, so we did CPR for a couple minutes," Yombik explained. "Got an AED, put the pads on, shocked him, got his pulse back."

A different nurse, Sue Kneehouse, rushed to use an automated external defibrillator on the man.

"It was really good, we worked as a team and got it done," she said.

"It just comes natural to you and I just gotta say - people just need to keep loving each other."

Almost immediately, the man was revived.

Other passengers on the flight stayed calm and cheered as the man was taken off on a stretcher in Detroit, according to the Capusano family from Ontario, Canada.

"The defibrillator brought him back and everyone started clapping," Nina Capusano,11, said.

"I think it's really important to do what you can even if you're not a medical professional to try and help someone because it's the better thing to do and really nice."

For Kruger, there was no hesitation for wanting to help the man in the moment.

Kruger said the nurses and EMT who volunteered to help didn't hesitate for a second.

He said: "It's absolutely the right thing to do. You have a chance to continue life and this is the only life that we have. How can you not?"

But all three stressed why learning CPR was crucial.

"It's so easy to learn, everyone should know CPR, and everyone should have an AED or at least know where there is an AED," Yombik asserted. "That's really what saved his life."

The flight continued to Orlando, reaching its destination at 12.44pm.

Medical privacy prevents Spirit from disclosing the status of the man's health.