Hero pub landlord gets humanitarian award for saving child's life in Milton Keynes town

Jonny Smith was manning his busy Coachmakers pub in Newport Pagnell when two hysterical parents ran up with a lifeless little boy in their arms.

Two-year-old Ewaan Vipin Koottunkal had choked on a grape at his nearby home and his parents’ efforts to dislodge it had failed. He was lifeless, floppy and blue with no pulse at all.

The family has no car and mum Jasna was desperately trying to call 999 for help.

"They were asking too many questions,” she said. “My son was dying. So we picked him up and ran outside to see if we could find someone to to get him to hospital.”

At the Coachmakers Arms, crowds had gathered in the garden to celebrate the town’s carnival. Landlord Jonny Smith heard the cries for help and ran outside.

"The little lad was not in a good way. There was no pulse and he was totally blue. His mum was fainting and everyone was panicking.. It was horrible,” he said.

Jonny has two sons who are members of Bletchley Boxing Club and he has completed a first aid course run by the club. While customers panicked or froze, he kept his cool and leapt into action.

"I grabbed the boy and tried everything I knew, everything I remembered from the course. I tried the Heimlich manouvre, banging him on the back, laying him over a bench face down. He was such a tiny little thing and I felt was throwing him around. But he still wasn’t breathing,” he said.

"My barmaid Kate Howe was feeling for a pulse but there was nothing.. no sign of life.”

Finally Jonny tried blowing heavily down the boy’s nose while Kate held open his mouth.

"Kate suddenly said ‘I can see the grape coming up. Do it again’...I gave another big blow and Kate was able to grab it,” he said.

But the toddler was still unresponsive, with no discernable pulse.

Jonny began CPR while waiting for the ambulances, again remembering all he’d been taught on the boxing club course.

“I did it for five or six minutes and we really thought he was dead. But then suddenly he gave a breath….” he said.

Ewaan was rushed to Oxford’s John Radcliffe hospital to be checked for brain damage after such a long time no breathing. Incredibly, there was none and he was discharged after a couple of days.

Jasna and her husband Vipin said a public thank you to Jonny. "God put him there at the right time. He saved my son’s life. We thought we had lost him,” they said.

Now, nine months on, Ewaan regularly waves the Coachmakers crew as he passes the pub with his parents. And this month Jonny and barmaid Kate were both presented with a special award by Newport Pagnell Town Council.

The Humanitarian Award recognises and act of bravery or extreme good deed.