An off-duty nurse and police officer saved a 6-year-old girl after providing nearly six minutes of CPR on Jan. 17.
Kynnedi Terry-Nunley was at a birthday party and staying the night at the Capitol Plaza Hotel in Jefferson City when she was seen at the bottom of the pool not moving. A child noticed and told his father, who jumped into the pool fully clothed to pull the unconscious child from the water, according to accounts from the child's mother, Kytrll Terry, and the nurse, Amanda Darby.
A registered nurse at SSM St. Joseph Hospital West in St. Louis, Darby was in the Capital City for a youth ice hockey tournament. She was with Robert Bell of the St. Charles County Sheriff's Department when they noticed the man jump into the pool, she said.
"The next thing I saw was him lift this girl from the pool and she was obviously lifeless," Darby said. "I ran over and we checked her pulse, and she was unresponsive. So I started CPR with chest compressions, and with each one she was spitting up water."
Darby and Bell alternated administering CPR for nearly six minutes. Darby described the first three minutes of CPR as feeling like it was two hours. The entire time the small child showed no response or pulse. But about five seconds before the paramedics arrived, she took a breath.
Kynnedi was taken to the emergency room at Capital Region Medical Center and was later transported to the University Hospital in Columbia. She was released from the hospital, and her first day back to school was last Thursday.
"I really could not bury my daughter, and I talked to the nurse just about every day after that happened," Kytrll said. "My daughter did not have a heartbeat or a pulse or anything. Things could have definitely went the other way. I do not know CPR; I would have just panicked."
On Feb. 22, the two are scheduled to see each other for the first time since the incident. Darby will be attending Kytrll's church and is being honored by the congregation.
"I am very excited to meet Kynnedi," Darby said. "I think I really was just in the right place at the right time, with Rob and I both being first responders. ... It was definitely a team rescue."
Kytrll now said she is going to learn CPR, and she mentioned Kynnedi told her she wants to take swimming lessons.