On a recent Monday morning, a pregnant woman in her ninth month went into active labor at her home in Jerusalem. Her husband urgently notified emergency services.  

United Hatzalah volunteer EMT Ariel Dray was exhausted after an eventful early morning. As the lead member of United Hatzalah’s Psychotrauma and Crisis Response Unit for the Jerusalem Geula Branch, he had been dispatched at 5:30 a.m. to a cardiac arrest. Jumping out of bed, he sped to the scene on his ambucycle. Sadly, the patient had already passed away by the time EMTs arrived. Dray provided psychotrauma interventions for family members at the scene. From there, he responded to a seizure, providing first aid until the ambulance arrived.

Finally heading home at 6:4 a.m., Dray received an alert on his communications device of a birth in progress nearby. Disregarding his exhaustion, he sped to the scene, arriving in under three minutes. 0

Met outside by a neighbor who led him up to the apartment, Dray found the mother crowning with the birth imminent. Dray notified United Hatzalah Dispatch and prepared the birth kit. Joined shortly by United Hatzalah volunteer EMT Yehuda Levi, the two successfully delivered a beautiful baby boy.

Dray and Levi immediately began to tend to the baby, who was in respiratory distress, while another EMT who had just arrived tended to the mother. Dray suctioned the baby’s mouth and nose and provided stimulations, while Levi began inhalation interventions. Thankfully, due to their swift actions, the baby began to cry, and his condition improved. A few minutes later, the Advanced Life Support Ambulance arrived, and the paramedic crew transported the mother and baby to the hospital.

“It’s really an amazing thing to be a part of bringing new life into the world,” said Dray. “Especially when, in the span of under two hours, being present and providing emotional intervention when one life sadly left the world to then be present shortly afterward at a birth is such a great feeling. It’s truly the circle of life.”