Beach resident says he's alive because of quick action by local fire and rescue crews

VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. — In early September, Thalia neighborhood residents Kim and Matt McGregor had to call 911.

“I just came downstairs and he said, ‘Call 911, I can barely breathe,’” Kim recalled.

“I’d never had that kind of problem before, so it was terrifying,” she said.

The crew from Fire Station 7 arrived at the house within minutes.

“Things just continued to spiral downward. We worked collaboratively as a team. We had a couple of supervisors show up as well,” said firefighter Jared Hernandez.

Matt was in respiratory arrest from an asthma attack aggravated by a virus.

“He kind of went unconscious; he turned blue,” Hernandez recalled.

When paramedic Elizabeth Cooper got there, Firefighter Hernandez and others were already fighting to save Matt’s life.

“For a while there, we were