On Friday, the US Capitol Police hockey team was participating in a charity tournament in Laurel to aid firefighters injured in the line of duty. St. Mary’s County sheriff’s deputy David Corcoran was in net for the team, which was the best possible place for him to be.

When Corcoran suffered a heart attack and collapsed on the ice, he was surrounded by paramedics.

“They turned around, saw him down,” Jordan Wiley, a firefighter and paramedic with DC Fire and EMS, said to WTOP. “This was a goalie in the middle of the game. …. He dropped down, was having crushing chest pains.”

Firefights and EMTs rushed to his aid. Corcoran didn’t have a pulse, so they performed CPR and used a defibrillator right on the ice. They saved his life. Before the ambulance even arrived, Corcoran was alert and speaking.

“That’s incredible,” said Wiley. “To be defibrillated two times and come around that quickly, where you’re actually talking after being in cardiac arrest, is almost unheard of.”

From NBC 4:

WTOP reports that the firefighters visited Corcoran in the hospital and presented him a jersey. Wiley, one of the DC firefighters who saved Corcoran’s life that night, says that the sheriff’s deputy is already planning a comeback.

Headline photo: DC Fire and EMS