Local News
April 25, 2008
Mother, Daughter, Rescue Woman At Seder
A mother and daughter rescue an ailing elderly woman during a seder.
Alan H. Feiler
Managing Editor
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Unlike matzoh, Chelsea Smith rises to the occasion on Passover.
Chelsea, an Owings Mills High School sophomore, proved that point last Sunday night, April 20, when she helped save the life of an elderly relative — a Hungarian-born Holocaust survivor — by thinking quickly and utilizing her cardiopulmonary resuscitation training.
“It’s an experience I’ll never forget,” said Chelsea, who turns 16 next month.
Chelsea and 23 relatives were in the middle of a second-night seder dinner at her uncle Gary Smith’s residence in Owings Mills when Lilly Feher, Chelsea’s 79-year-old great-aunt through marriage, suddenly passed out. Some diners thought Mrs. Feher, who speaks little English, simply fell asleep.
“We looked across the table and saw Gary’s mother-in-law [Mrs. Feher] was not breathing and slumped over,” said Fred T. Smith, Chelsea’s father and Gary Smith’s brother. “She wasn’t conscious, and her head was slumped down. So we looked around to see if anyone knew CPR. It was crazy, really crazy.”
At the time, Chelsea was in another room, hunting for the afikomen with a cousin, said her mother, Susan L. Smith. Chelsea was supposed to leave earlier that evening, because of school the next morning, but she happened to stick around.
“I yelled for Chelsea,” said Mrs. Smith. “I knew she’d know what to do, even though I’d had CPR training many years ago. There was no pulse.”
Chelsea admitted she balked at first. “I didn’t want to be put on the spot like that, with her life on my shoulders,” she said. “It was scary, but I realized I was the only one there who knew what to do.”
After laying Mrs. Feher on her back and calling 911, the seder attendees watched nervously as Mrs. Smith and Chelsea, a lifeguard at the Owings Mills Jewish Community Center trained in CPR, began working on the older woman.
“They were administering breaths,” said Fred Smith. “Chelsea started with the [chest] compressions, while Susan did the breathing and pulled out food blocking her throat. It was pretty unbelievable. Chelsea was in charge. They got busy.”
After a couple of minutes, Mrs. Feher regained consciousness. “She just snapped back,” said Mrs. Smith. “Her eyes opened, and she jumped up. Chelsea did what she knew she could do. She was cool. I was very impressed with my daughter.”
Said Chelsea: “I knew if I panicked, everyone else would panic, and I’d never get it done.”
Emergency crews arrived at the house eight to 10 minutes after the initial phone call. “They brought life back to her,” Fred Smith said of his daughter and wife. “[Mrs. Feher] wouldn’t be here today if not for them.”
He said Mrs. Feher was a bit dazed and out of sorts. “She said, ‘All I need is a little soup. I’ll be fine if I get some soup,’” he recalled with a laugh.
After Mrs. Feher was taken by ambulance to Greater Baltimore Medical Center for treatment and tests, “everyone stood and applauded my daughter and wife,” said Fred Smith. “It was unreal.”
The seder, according to the Smith brothers, took a while to return to “normalcy.”
“We were all kind of looking at each other — ‘OK, what do we do now?’” said Gary Smith, a Beth Tfiloh congregant. “But we all started to lighten up and talked a bit, and we finished the meal and did a quick wrap-up [of the Haggadah reading]. We were all pretty beat up at that point.”
Fred Smith said he couldn’t be prouder of his daughter, who became a bat mitzvah at Owings Mills’ Beth Israel Synagogue, and his wife. “We let her sleep in the next morning,” he said of Chelsea. “She had an opportunity to save a life, and she really came through.”
Gary Smith said for a youngster to perform such an act of mercy on an elder during the Festival of Freedom resonates strongly with Passover’s themes of family, fearlessness and fortitude.
“This was an exemplary, noble and selfless action,” he said. “She did not think of herself. She wasn’t scared or concerned. She just went to work. It was just amazing to have it happen right in front of you. I’d let that kid do open-heart surgery on me right now.”
Chelsea said she’s just glad her CPR training came in handy. “I felt like a hero that night, at the right place at the right time,” she said. “It’s just an amazing experience to know you saved someone’s life.”