"Only 10% of people survive this. The 'Widowmaker' is what they call it. If it wasn't for her, we wouldn't be talking here today," 63-year-old Ken Jeffries tells Inside Edition.
A hero nurse jumped into action and saved a passenger having a heart attack at an airport.
Claire Cerbie was at the airport in Charlotte waiting to board her morning flight to Knoxville when she saw a man who she believed was in distress.
"I heard someone kind of making a snoring noise, I went over, checked for a pulse, he didn't have a pulse," Cerbie says. "We got some other guys around us to help get him on the ground and we started CPR."
Cerbie says she knew what to do after hearing the man's snoring and breathing.
"I've heard it before and it's normally indicative of a fast heart rhythm causing a cardiac arrest," Cerbie says.
The man who suffered the heart attack, 63-year-old Ken Jeffries, tells Inside Edition he was not aware of what was going on.
"No tingling, numbness, headaches or anything of that nature. Little shortness of breath, but I'm thinking, 'Okay, I'm just getting a little older, I can't do the things I normally do,'" Jeffries says.
Jeffries was rushed to the hospital, where he had emergency surgery to open an artery that was 80% blocked.
His surgeon Dr. William Downey spoke with Inside Edition.
"Most people who this happens to die. This is sudden death. Ken was dead and Claire pulled him back. Claire's CPR kept him alive," Downey says.
Jeffries reunited with Cerbie and thanked her for saving him.
"Only 10% of people survive this. The 'Widowmaker' is what they call it. If it wasn't for her, we wouldn't be talking here today. My kids and wife would be attending a funeral," Jeffries says.
