FDNY Holds Annual Second Chance Ceremony

May 23, 2023

10 Survivors to be Reunited with the Rescuers Who Saved Their Lives

In celebration of National EMS Week 2023, FDNY will hold its annual Second Chance Ceremony on Wednesday, May 24, at 10 a.m. at Liberty Warehouse – 260 Conover Street, Brooklyn. This special event will reunite 10 patients who have survived cardiac arrest with the Paramedics, Emergency Medical Technicians, FDNY EMS Officers, Firefighters, Dispatchers, bystanders, and other first responders who helped save their lives. The ceremony can be viewed live on the Department’s website, www.nyc.gov/FDNY.

The 10 survivors include a premature newborn baby girl who made a full recovery, an eight-year-old boy, an NYPD Auxiliary officer on his way to work, and a man from New Jersey who good Samaritans aided before FDNY EMS arrived.

Several of this year’s survivors received cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) from bystanders before on-duty FDNY members arrived. Immediate CPR, coupled with defibrillation within the first few minutes after sudden cardiac arrest, can greatly increase a victim’s chance of survival. The FDNY CPR Training Unit offers free compressions only CPR training throughout the city and has trained more than 200,000 New Yorkers to perform bystander CPR, including more than 80,000 high school students.

For more information about free bystander CPR training from the FDNY, call 718-281-3888 or visit www.fdnysmart.org/cpr.

WHO: Fire Commissioner Laura Kavanagh; Chief of Department John Hodgens; Chief of EMS Michael Fields; Chief Medical Director Dr. Glenn Asaeda; 10 survivors, their families and the first responders who saved them

WHERE: Liberty Warehouse, 260 Conover Street, Brooklyn

WHEN: Wednesday, May 24 at 10 a.m.

**PHOTO OP**