Kendenup teens recognised as heroes after quick-thinking first aid and CPR saves woman from severe snake bite

Two Kendenup teens have been labelled heroes for saving Kylie Williams’ life after she had a life-threatening reaction to a snake bite, performing lifesaving CPR when she flatlined in her own home. What Ms Williams thought to be a scratch from a stick on the steps outside her Kendenup home on the afternoon of March 8 turned out to be a bite from a venomous snake. Thinking nothing of it at the time, it wasn’t until half an hour later, at about 3pm, when she began to feel the effects of the venom. It was then that she asked her daughter, 13-year-old Matilda Smith-Williams, to call for help. “I came in the house and half an hour later my face started going numb and my tongue started going numb,” she said. “Then I looked down and noticed something on my foot and I said to Matilda I think I’ve been bitten by a snake. “Then I started to feel really weird so she called triple-0.” She said that after the triple-0 call, her body started to react intensely and her memory began to fade, with one of her last recollections being Matilda’s 16-year-old friend Chloe McKenzie arriving. “I remember laying on the couch and I was kind of in and out because I remember Matilda kept waking me up,” she said. “Then I remember Chloe walking through the door and that’s the last thing I remember right until the paramedics.” Ms Williams credited Chloe and her first aid training as saving her life. “Chloe did a first aid course prior (to this) because of her early childhood course through TAFE,” she said. “She did full CPR on me — compressions, mouth-to-mouth, everything. “She did amazing. “If my daughter didn’t call Chloe I’d be dead.” The teenager performed CPR until the paramedics arrived, saving her life when she flatlined. Ms Williams flatlined a second time when paramedics arrived to assist before she was thankfully revived and taken via St John WA ambulance to Mt Barker Hospital where she was given snake antivenom. Chloe, who had only completed her first aid and CPR course about a week before the incident, said she was still overwhelmed. “If I didn’t have that, I wouldn’t have known what to do,” she said. “I am still in a bit of shock now.” The fortunate timing is something that plays on the mind of Matilda, who remembers thinking she was about to lose her mum. “Chloe got here just in time because I couldn’t wake her and then she stopped breathing and Chloe had to give her mouth-to-mouth and CPR,” she said. “I was just glad Chloe had her first aid certificate.” “Watching it was scary because I couldn’t do anything, I didn’t know what to do. “It was so scary, I thought she was gone.” Now fully recovered after further blood tests at Albany Health Campus, Ms Williams was full of gratitude for the paramedics, the hospital staff, and, most importantly, Chloe and Matilda. “If it wasn’t for these two and the paramedics I’d be dead,” she said. “For two young kids to go through something like this, they need to be recognised. They’re little heroes.” She encouraged all parents to enrol their children in first aid courses.