A one-hour class can save a life; that’s what 15-year old McDonald’s worker Sydney Raley learned when she instinctively deployed the Heimlich maneuver to save a choking customer.
Working at the Eden Prairie McDonalds south of Minneapolis for around seven months, the young woman clocked in on a Saturday shift expecting, as one might imagine, for everything to proceed as normal.
After handing one woman part of her order, Raley departed the drive-thru window, only to return moments later to explain the rest was on its way. That’s when she saw that the customer appeared to be choking.
“She was coughing like crazy, and I noticed she was gagging.” Raley told CNN. “Her daughter was in the passenger seat and she looked so freaked out. I immediately knew ‘Oh, no, she’s choking.’”
Raley straight away instructed her colleague to call 911, then leapt out of the drive-thru window to help the choking customer. Having taken a Red Cross babysitter first aid class, Raley used the Heimlich manuever with the aid of a bystander.
