Cardiac arrest survivor thanks “superhero” lifeguards and GHA after miracle recovery

February is Heart Month, the Gibraltar Cardiac Association is raising awareness of heart issues and in this article Eyleen Gomez speaks to cardiac arrest survivor Joseph ‘Pepe’ Vecino.

A Gibraltarian man who suffered a sudden cardiac arrest at the Europort pool has spoken of the “one in a million” chance that saved his life, paying tribute to the lifeguards, ambulance crews and GHA staff who brought him back from the brink and helped him learn to walk and talk again.

The incident happened less than nine months ago during what had begun as a routine swim.

“It was the 29th of May 2025 at around quarter to eight o'clock in the morning. I was swimming in the GASA Europort pool.”

“After I finished my swimming session, I went to get into the shower, [one witness] saw me coming out of the shower and collapsing, falling to the floor, and when I collapsed I hit my head. I was losing a lot of blood at the same time as having a cardiac arrest,” he told the Chronicle.

What happened next can only be described as a race against time in the changing rooms, where staff and lifeguards had to act immediately.

He explains how lifeguard Christian Piner saved his life.

“I was lucky. I was in the changing room with Jamie Oliveira who went up and called the lifeguards.”

“Christian came down and started the CPR to bring me back. He managed to bring me back but my heart stopped more than once.”

Other lifeguards brought a defibrillator to resuscitate Mr Vecino. And the combined efforts kept him alive while the ambulance was making its way.

The CPR was so intensive that he later learned he had suffered multiple broken ribs.

At St Bernard’s Hospital, doctors were immediately confronted with a complex and life-threatening situation due to a serious head laceration and brain inflammation. As a result, he was placed into an induced coma.

Further tests revealed that his arteries were severely blocked.

“They realised that some of the arteries were blocked, one of them was 85% and the other actually was 96% of blockage,” he said.

“So they had a tough time in the catheter lab. They spent six hours with me trying to put in the stent.”

“It normally takes an hour or something like that. But due to the sedation, brain inflammation, my heart not having a steady beat, they took about six hours.”

He praised the surgeon Mr Roger Moore and said “we are very lucky having a guy like that and the new state of art cath lab. They did a wonderful job.”

The procedure was also complicated by the size of Mr Vecino’s arteries.

“The problem was that my arteries were too big. Normal arteries are between two or four millimetre, mine were six millimetres, and the stent was five millimetres. So they managed to do a miracle.”

Following this, he spent 22 days in an induced coma and remembers none of it. The doctor told him that, with these types of events, the brain will erase the trauma.

“I just remember getting into the shower,” he said.

Coming out of the coma was just the start of his recovery journey, initially he had to relearn basic functions.

“After those 22 days, I had to start all over again, start talking, start eating. My legs wouldn't respond.”

“We have a great physio team at the GHA, and they started with the physio”.

“I was in hospital for four months until August.”

The experience has led to major changes in his life and outlook. He has gradually returned to swimming and gym training, but says that getting back into the pool was psychologically difficult.
He now has clear advice for others and that is “to live, as much as they can, a healthy life.”

“Meaning controlling your intake [of food] and try to do some type of activity, swimming, walking, bike, whatever.”

But above all, he warns about the impact of stress.

“Stress is a killer, and I've been stressed for a long while,” he said.

“I think that is one of the major things that made me reach this stage in my life. The thing to prevent this type of cardiac arrest or something like that is to stop the stress around you, and that is very difficult nowadays.”

He now feels like he is a totally different person.

He cannot stress his gratitude to Mr Piner and Mr Olivera or the other lifeguards that day enough, but also to the ambulance staff and the GHA.

“I would like, on my behalf and that of my family, to thank Christian Piner who saved me and the GSLA staff, who saved my life, the staff of the GHA and everyone involved,” he said.

“They were 10 out of 10.”

“People complain about the GHA, but I can tell you, on my side, they were brilliant. We are very, very lucky having a service like that.”

The past nine months have been a hard one for Mr Vecino and his family in other ways.

Last month he lost his brother, Juan Jesus Vecino, known to many as ‘Susi’.

However, Susi was also the first person to donate all their organs here in Gibraltar and, in doing so, saved a number of lives.

“The sad thing is that I was worse than my brother. I nearly died, yeah, but I managed to come out but my brother never did.,” he said.

“I know that my wife and my family, my sister, especially my sister, they've been through this situation twice in a few months, with me and then with my brother.”

But, “the good thing in hindsight to this is that we managed with the organs to help some other recipients. That’s a legacy he's left behind.”

Mr Vecino hopes, by sharing his story, it will raise awareness about stress, heart health, and the importance of acting fast in an emergency, while honouring those who saved his life and those whose legacy lives on through others.