Trail Tales | Miracle at Sunny Bay
If not for first responders who knew CPR, a friend's uncle would not be alive today
People in Hong Kong who aren’t in a hospital when they are stricken by sudden cardiac arrest face grim odds – with the survival rate estimated at a mere 1 to 3 per cent, according to the Hong Kong College of Cardiology.
It is therefore truly fortunate that Philip Wong is alive and well today.
Just five days ago, on the searing hot Saturday of June 8, the avid cyclist was found lying unconscious at the side of the road alongside his bicycle at Sunny Bay, Lantau Island. Wong had a heart attack, and if help hadn’t arrived as soon as it did, he would have most likely been a statistic.
In fact, the chain of events that have unfolded since the incident makes this nothing short of a miracle.
I first found out about Philip – well, I only knew him as “crazy cycling uncle” then – from my good friend Michelle. At about noon on Saturday, a couple of hours before she was to give me a lift to Repulse Bay for her baptism, she told me I had to make my way to the beach on my own as her “crazy cycling uncle” had gotten into an accident and was in ICU.
Later that day, I received a forwarded email from my triathlon club teammate Kent with the subject: “Sad news”. The original email was from another cyclist Glyn Pearson to the Lantau Buffalos’ cycling group mailing list:
“This morning I stopped to help give CPR to a lone cyclist who was lying at the side of the road between Disneyland and Sunny Bay turn off,” Pearson wrote. “No one seemed to know who he was, what had happened nor how long he had been without assistance.