Elmont salon owner saves stranger's life with Heimlich maneuver

The event was caught on surveillance camera outside the Meacham Avenue salon.

News 12 Staff

Nov 19, 2021, 11:10 PM

Updated 1,133 days ago

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The owner of a salon helped save the life of a stranger who was choking Wednesday afternoon in Elmont.
The event was caught on surveillance camera outside the Meacham Avenue salon.
Zakira Naqvi says she and her coworkers heard a scream outside that someone's daughter was choking.
"She couldn't breathe, she was badly choking," Naqvi says.
Naqvi rushed outside and began to perform the Heimlich maneuver on the woman.
She says she did it around two or three times softly but the woman still couldn't breathe.
The salon owner got her focus and continued despite being panicked and upset.
"After that she's falling, she's like bending over front," Naqvi says. "Then I just did it real hard. Then the candy or whatever it was in the mouth came out."
She said it felt so good to save somebody's life.
"I was like shaking," Naqvi says. "I never had an experience like that."
She says she only learned how to perform the Heimlich around a year ago when her son showed her.
Naqvi says the woman and her whole family came to thank her on Thursday.