Runner's Facebook plea reaches life-saving Del. nurse
It's the Facebook plea viewed by more than a million and a half people.
"Hi, this is Bill Amirault. I am hoping you can help me find the person or people that saved my life this past weekend," the video begins.
Bill Amirault was running the Key West Half Marathon.
"As I was rounding the corner to the finish line, I got tunnel vision and went down on a knee, tapped a bystander, and told him I was about to faint. Then I blacked out and I don't remember anything from there," Amirault said.
A group of bystanders rushed to his rescue. They were runners who just so happen to work in the medical field.
In the group was Amy Smythe, a cardiovascular nurse at Christiana Care Health System in Wilmington.
"I felt for his pulse. I couldn't feel a pulse and that's when two other bystanders came up and we started CPR," Smythe said.
It turns out Amirault has a ventricular arrhythmia which caused his heart to stop.
Amirault says he never saw the angels to who saved him, so he harnessed the power of social media.
"I'm still here to talk about it so I am hoping you can share this video with anyone that might know someone who went to the Keys," Amirault said in the video.
Smythe says she searched the local news for any updates on Amirault's condition.
Then a friend told her to check Facebook.
"I immediately started crying. I could not believe how good he looked. It was very overwhelming," Smythe said.
And Amirault did get a chance to say thank you.
"And he sounded wonderful," Smythe said.
Thanks to Facebook, Amirault has also been able to find the three others who rushed to his rescue.
"It was a blessing. It was a miracle. It was the right people in the right place, at the right time," Amirault said.
Amirault says he's using the power of this viral post to spread another critical message - learn CPR!
He is.
He says if no one at the race knew it, he wouldn't be here to talk about.
Amirault says he rarely uses social media, but he told Action News, "Wow, this thing works great!"
