As soon as firefighter Tim Callanan yanked a big hunk of steak out of Mayor Art Ward’s throat Saturday evening, the mayor’s color started coming back.
Until that moment, the situation appeared pretty dire.
Though Ward, 63, remains in the intensive care unit at Bristol Hospital in critical condition, family and friends are hoping for a full recovery in the days ahead.
Ward collapsed about 10 minutes after arriving at the Italian Social Club for a tailgating party before the big University of Connecticut football game Saturday evening.
He was eating a steak when he suddenly got up from the table and walked off a bit.
Someone noticed the mayor’s distress and a couple of guys rushed to help, including Dale Grande, a club member, who may have been the first to see that Ward needed help.
When Callanan first saw Ward, the mayor was already on his back with Grande starting to do abdominal thrusts to try to get him breathing again. Callanan said he jumped in, too.
A state police officer, Chris Porrini, joined in right away as well, Callanan said, and they tried compressions and rescue breathing on Ward.
“People were hollering that he choked on something,” Callanan said.
He said they couldn’t see his throat because the mayor’s mouth was clamped shut so they had to pry open the mayor’s mouth.
At that point, one of the three police officers responding to 911 calls, Ryan Kulig, pulled out a small flashlight and pointed it down the mayor’s throat, Callanan said.
“I saw something and reached in and got a pretty sizeable piece of steak,” Callanan said.
A police report said that once the steak was removed, color began returning to the mayor’s face quickly. Click here for the full story.
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Copyright 2010. All rights reserved. Contact Steve Collins at scollins@bristolpress.com
13 comments:
Good work Callanan, Kulig and all the other First Responders.
What an unexpected thing to happen to someone. Life is so fragile. My thoughts and prayers go to his family. No body is perfect or can please everyone but I think he has been the best Mayor in the last several years. Cockayne now has the oportunity to put his money where his mouth is. He can now fire everyone he wants, suck up the new blood and make all the changes he wanted to make in Bristol...
Lets give the MAYORS FAMILY some private time and let KEN start firing these jerks. THIS IS A GREAT CITY AND WE CANT LET IT SINK ANY FURTHER. Ken bring down the hatchet to much dead wood.
How many different headlines do we have to read about ART let him rest. Hoping he gets the vet job and COCKAYNE CLEANS HOUSE.
Ken ain't gonna do zilch.
He is all mouth, but will flounder when the chips are on the line.
Even Krawiecki can't save him.
Ken will do fine he doesnt have to kiss the unions ass for votes . He works for the people not his buddies. The chief is worried along with his playmate fergusin. These two have been playing games too long. they have been caught in more then one way.
When Tax time comes next year w3hat will the dems say with another increase. Who will they blame they have done crap.
cockayne's dirty laundry is due to come out now...he needs to clean his own house first!
Divneer and fergi are having meetings to see if they coulod cover there asses.
8:37 pm - Why do you say Krawiecki couldn't save Ken? Lisa Moody ran this state for years while Jody Rell pretended to be governor. It will be the same in Bristol if Ken gets elected.
I'm sure Mr. Cockayne would like nothing better than to clean house but that is not possible. Some of you people act like this is a dictatorship and whatever the mayor or acting mayor says goes. Wake up! That's why we have a city council and that's why we have committees and chairs of committees.
I, frankly, am quite annoyed with the fact that Mr. Cockayne seems to be playing way too much of a role as acting mayor as it is, calling meetings, press releases, etc. I believe that Mr. Cockayne should be dealing with ONLY pressing issues and attempting to do anything more than that is inappropriate.
Our mayor is still with us. Mr. Cockayne should be making sure that things run smoothly in Mayor Ward's absence and not listening to these brainless wonders calling for resignations and firings and layoffs and everything under the sun.
O-dumb:
Don't you ever get tired of being a partisan jerk?
Do you make all your Democrat pals proud?
Cockayne is a successful and intelligent fiscal conservative. Even if he takes advice from Ed Krawiecki, it's still better than taking marching orders from the union bosses like every Democrat in the state of Connecticut does.
4:04
Is that what we want?
Is that what we deserve?
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