FIVE police officers will receive life saving awards for bringing a 70-year-old heart attack victim back from the brink of death after he collapsed in Kidderminster town centre.

Terry Quirk was shopping for a birthday present for his daughter on September 19 last year when he suffered a heart attack outside KFC on Comberton Hill.

Luckily. trained police officers were just a few yards away conducting a knife arch event at Kidderminster Railway Station, and were on the scene within seconds after being radioed by a colleague who saw Mr Quirk collapse.

PC Lee Strong immediately began CPR and PC Simeon Darrall-Jones fetched oxygen from his vehicle and began administering it.

Stourport PC Sam Maher took over the CPR and PC Andrew Forbes located a defibrillator at the nearby Severn Valley Railway and shocked the man. PC Michael Harrison also assisted with CPR.

The life and death battle lasted for some 15 minutes until paramedics arrived and rushed Mr Quirk to hospital, where he was placed into a coma but went on to survive his ordeal.

Kidderminster Shuttle:

Mr Quirk told The Shuttle: "Someone was watching over me that day. What are the chances of it happening with five trained police officers 100 metres away?

"I was dead and they brought me back. I owe them my life."

PC Maher said: "Often when a person reaches that stage there's no coming back from it.

"If it wasn't for the quick thinking of my colleagues to recognise just how unwell Mr Quirk was and take action it could have been a very different outcome.

"We do the training but never really expect to use it - we're police officers not paramedics - so to know you have helped to save someone's life is incredibly rewarding. It was very much a team effort."

All five officers will be awarded Royal Humane Society Resuscitation Certificates and have also won the praise of the organisation's secretary.

Andrew Chapman said: "This is another case which brings home the importance of as many people as possible learning life-saving techniques such as CPR.

"Fortunately police are trained in these techniques but many members of the public are also trained in them and a lot of our awards go to ordinary members of the public who have saved lives using them.

“I’m sure no one who learns how to administer CPR ever really wants to use it but as this case shows, it can, as it did here, make the difference between life and death.

"These officers were involved in a wonderful bit of team work and as a result they saved a life. They all richly deserve the awards they are to receive.”

Mr Quirk plans to fundraise to buy another defibrillator for Kidderminster town centre once he has recovered.