Awkward look leads to life-saving CPR Published Nov. 3, 2015 ROBINS AIR FORCE BASE, Ga. -- The awkward look on his neighbor’s face was all it took for Senior Master Sgt. James Hartzog to leap into life-saving action. Hartzog was driving home from lunch with his brother when he noticed the grimace, then the collapse, as his neighbor dropped to the ground while mowing the lawn. He quickly exited his car to investigate. “It was a warm day, but he wasn’t sweating,” said Hartzog, the Emergency Management superintendent in the Headquarters, Air Force Reserve Command Inspector General’s Office. “I tried talking to him, but he was unresponsive. I checked his pulse but couldn’t feel anything, but he was still breathing.” Hartzog started chest compression and told his brother to alert the gentleman’s wife and to call 911. While Hartzog did the compression, he talked to the 911 operator until the emergency service vehicles arrived. Hartzog explained to the medical technicians what he had done as they placed the gentleman in the ambulance. A few days later, Hartzog spoke to the neighbor’s wife. The doctors told her that her husband is alive because of the CPR Hartzog administered. Hartzog said he’s no hero. The 22-year Air Force veteran doesn’t have any specialized medical training, just the CPR everyone in the Air Force learns. He was in the right place, at the right time, with the right training that Saturday afternoon. “We often don’t think CPR classes as being that big a deal or that important, but it could be the thing that saves someone’s life,” he said.