THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, May 6, 1995 TAG: 9505060295
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY SUSIE STOUGHTON, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: SUFFOLK LENGTH: Medium: 95 lines
Clutching her granddaughter tightly in her arms, Lillie Carpenter believes she is holding a miracle.
Nothing else can explain to her why 13-month-old Chelsea Byrd, one of her four grandchildren, is alive after nearly drowning in a backyard pool last week.
``She's a living angel as far as I care,'' Carpenter said Friday. ``She came back as one.''
It took only minutes for Chelsea to slip away and fall into the water. Fortunately, it took only minutes for help to arrive in the rural section west of downtown Suffolk, where emergency services are strained.
A year ago, the miracle might not have happened. Now firefighters - trained as first-responders with rescue equipment on their trucks - assist two volunteer rescue squads assigned to cover the sprawling, 430-square-mile city.
But rescue officials also say Chelsea would not have survived if Carpenter's neighbor, Patricia Horton, had not initially performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation, or CPR, on the child.
``Without that, her heart would have been completely stopped,'' said Tony Stewart, a Nansemond-Suffolk Rescue Squad paramedic.
Carpenter's daughter, Deborah Byrd, had brought Chelsea and her 2 1/2-year-old sister, Nicole, from Norfolk to visit their grandmother on Deer Path Road. She left Chelsea in a crib in the living room just after noon April 25 and fixed a sandwich in the kitchen. About 10 minutes later she checked the crib - and it was empty.
Somehow Chelsea had gotten out and wandered through a French door, unlocked and held open by Nicole, onto a deck. She went up three steps and through a wooden gate, which is usually latched, to an upper deck beside the above-ground pool.
Byrd, Chelsea's mother, found her floating face down in the half-filled, 4-foot-deep pool. Byrd jumped in, picked her up and laid her on the blue tiles edging the pool. Standing in the water, she started CPR.
But Byrd, 20, was too distraught to remember the techniques she had learned just after Chelsea was born with an irregular heart beat.
``It was devastating when I saw the look on her face,'' she said.
Carpenter, peeling potatoes at the kitchen sink, ran out and took over, praying, ``God, help me remember what I need to do here.''
Byrd called the 911 emergency phone number while her mother continued CPR. Before long, however, Carpenter also became distraught.
``There were no vital signs and she started turning blue,'' Carpenter said. ``I knew I had lost her.''
She screamed for someone to go next door and get Horton, who works for the American Red Cross in Norfolk.
The neighbor came running, and with help from the 911 dispatcher, she performed CPR for what seemed a very long time.
Within minutes of the 911 call, Suffolk police officer T.J. Wheeler arrived, with Stewart - who had been close by at a restaurant - right behind him in a rescue car. Shortly, three firefighters from Station 3 on Lake Kilby Road about three miles away rolled up.
Soon after that, a Nansemond-Suffolk ambulance arrived from downtown, about eight miles away. The emergency workers, who saw Horton was handling the resuscitation effort, asked her to continue while they unpacked their equipment and prepared to work on Chelsea.
``She did not have a pulse we could find,'' Stewart said. ``And she was ice cold.''
The rescue workers wrapped her in a blanket and hooked up emergency equipment. Paramedic Lynn Perry scooped her up in his arms and carried her to the ambulance, the others running alongside.
With police officers stopping traffic, they rushed to Obici Hospital in downtown Suffolk. Stewart and Perry, who each has a child close to Chelsea's age, waited outside the curtained treatment area.
About 15 minutes later, they heard a scream.
``Lynn and I just looked at each other with tears in our eyes, thinking, `She's going to be OK,' '' Stewart said.
Chelsea was transferred to Children's Hospital of The Kings Daughters in Norfolk for three days. On Friday, a week after Chelsea was released, Byrd brought the children to Suffolk to thank those involved in the rescue.
Chelsea fearlessly tried to head back out to the pool.
``To this day, she is not even afraid of water,'' Carpenter said.
Now, however, there is a safety chain high on the door.
``You can't be too cautious,'' Carpenter said.
Chelsea, spunky as ever, eventually fell asleep in her grandmother's arms in a rocking chair.
``The child survived because everything was in place,'' Stewart said. ``Usually, most things don't work. This time it did.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo by MICHAEL KESTNER, Staff
Lillie Carpenter holds her granddaughter Chelsea, who almost drowned
while visiting Carpenter with her mother, Deborah Byrd, last week. A
neighbor and quick work by Suffolk personnel saved the girl.
KEYWORDS: RESCUE EMERGENCY MEDICAL TREATMENT by CNB