A Port Authority K-9 sergeant was honored Wednesday for saving the life of a retired firefighter who suffered a heart attack while driving on the Belt Parkway last year.
Sergeant Kenneth Harris, 47, reunited with retired FDNY firefighter John Deliso, of Battalion 21, at the morning ceremony hosted by the Uniformed Firefighters Association at his former firehouse on Staten Island.
The two men tightly hugged and started laughing and crying when they saw each other.
“It’s a blessing,” said Harris, a 17-year veteran of the Port Authority Police Department, of the special moment.
“You’re the blessing! I don’t know what made you stop but I’m glad you did! I’ve been thinking about you everyday since it happened and I just didn’t know how to find you,” Deliso replied tearfully.
“This is the first time my wife or kids ever saw me cry in my life,” he added.
At one point, Deliso put his head against Harris’ and told him in a whisper, “You saved my life.”
“Without you I wouldn’t be here with my kids. I pray for you everyday,” he continued.
The incident happened on a hot and sunny August 3, 2022 just before 3 p.m. when Harris was driving from an assignment at John F. Kennedy airport to Port Newark on the Belt Parkway.
Harris, who normally works with K9 units and described a lot of his daily duties as “administrative,” noticed a car in the left bound lane had hit the highway divider between exits 13 and 14 on the westbound side of the highway.
“As I pulled up, I could see there were other motorists out of their cars already, not in an accident, but they looked panicked,” Harris told The Post on Tuesday.
Harris got out of his car and, with the help of a good Samaritan — 69-year-old special forces Army veteran Raymond Ponce de Leon — dragged the driver’s unconscious body out of his vehicle.
“I was going home from the VA. I saw the sergeant’s patrol car with its lights on and I just immediately pulled over. I wanted to help,” Ponce de Leon, who was also at the ceremony at the quarters of Engine 152/Battalion 21 told The Post of the moment he jumped into the fray.
Harris would later find out the driver was Deliso.
“I didn’t know he was a firefighter. I was just trying to save a life,” Harris said.
Harris and Ponce de Leon laid Deliso on the ground and checked his vitals before starting CPR, Harris said.
“My training kicked in and I immediately started CPR,” Harris explained.
Harris administered chest compressions while Ponce de Leon delivered rescue breaths to Deliso, he said.
“I was breathing in his mouth. We worked on him for a long time but I felt no pulse. It felt like a lifetime that we were working on him,” Ponce de Leon recalled.
Harris requested EMS over his radio and an ambulance arrived not long after.
“Your time is warped in those moments. It seemed like a long time until help arrived, but they got to me really quickly,” Harris recalled.
Deliso’s pulse came back before he was put in the ambulance, Harris said.
“I knew he was breathing at that time. I had felt a pulse, so I felt well about that,” Harris said.
The ambulance took Deliso to Brookdale Hospital where Deliso was taken into emergency heart surgery, said UFA Staten Island trustee Eric Bischoff said, who organized the ceremony.
Harris said once he got back to work at Port Newark, Bischoff called him and told him Deliso was going to be OK.
“I really felt great about that,” Harris said.
The hero cop was presented with a plaque in the formal FDNY ceremony, featuring three fire chiefs from Staten Island, as well as Port Authority police chiefs and State Sen. Jessica Scarcella-Spanton (D-NY).
Harris also got emotional hugs from Deliso’s mother and father, Emily and John.
“Thank you for my son! Thank you for my son’s life! Thank you for bringing him back to all of us. God bless you,” Emily told him.
Both Harris, a married dad of four daughters, and Deliso, also married with three children, live on Staten Island.
“This firehouse, this is where I worked the last 14 years of my career. I got a lot of great memories here. But meeting you here today, this is one of the best memories I’ll have from this place,” Deliso told Harris on Wednesday.
Ponce de Leon, who was also honored at the event, said he only learned that Deliso survived when the FDNY reached out to him last week about attending the ceremony.
“About a week ago they called me and they told me they wanted me to come to this and I said is this a joke! That guy lived? I thought he was gone! I’m quite sure that God saved his life,” he said.
The ceremony to honor both men was delayed until this fall due to Deliso’s health.
“We had to wait a while because it took (Deliso) some time to recover,” Bishoff explained.
FDNY Battalion Chief Rick Flood spoke at the moving event, noting Deliso had a massive heart attack, was in a coma for two weeks, but had somehow “pulled through.”
“It took…months but he pulled through. But none of that would have happened without these [Harris and Ponce de Leon]. I believe God put these two men in John’s path that day,” Flood said.
The president of the Port Authority Sergeant’s Benevolent Association, Robert Zafonte, said Harris will also be recognized at a future medal ceremony.
“He went above and beyond and to me that’s just an example of his selfless dedication to the profession and the people he wants to help. He is a humble, humble person, and I can tell you that his actions are a good example for the department on how to conduct yourself while you’re on and off duty,” Zafonte said.
“If he didn’t take the actions that he did, this family was probably going to have one of the worst Christmases or holiday seasons. Now they can sit there and be grateful for having their loved ones with them the entire time.”
Deliso’s wife, Toni, who also attended the ceremony, agreed.
She tearfully hugged Harris’ wife Tamika after a Post reporter introduced the two women and explained “Thank you, thank you! God Bless you!”
“If your husband hadn’t been there… I don’t know what.. I know, I’d be a widow right now” she said.
Additional reporting by Tina Moore