FedEx driver with great timing saves 85-year-old Beachwood woman's life with 911 call

BEACHWOOD, Ohio - A late flight from Texas on Wednesday bringing an 85-year-old woman’s FedEx package to Cleveland was the beginning of what her family believes was a snow ball of fate to save her life.

Janice Bloom's package was to be delivered late Wednesday afternoon, but the driver who had the package in her truck fell ill.

Sam Campagna, a 21-year veteran of FedEx, then took some of his colleague's packages realizing his route would allow him to deliver them by noon. That was about the time Bloom was suffering a drop in blood sugar from her diabetes. It was so severe she barely knew her name, but then came a knock on the door.

"You have a late flight, you have a sick driver, Sam going out of his way to try to do something nice for somebody. And it turns out he ends up with the package where the older lady was sick and able to get there on time. He had a conversation with her, and as he talked to her, he saw that she wasn't responding very well, seemed to be sick, and just called 911," said FedEx manager of operations Jeff Clow.

Bloom's son, Edward, and his siblings had been trying to find out who the driver was from Fed Ex's corporate offices since Wednesday, as soon as they discovered how their mother had been rescued. They family was only told the name "Sam," tracking the driver down by the date and time of the package's attempted delivery.

Campagna hadn't even told his bosses about the incident, hoping it would just be racked up to paying it forward. It was news to Clow on Friday.

"A lot of times when you picture a hero, you picture Superman with a cape on and Sam didn't need a cape, all he needed was a cell phone," Clow said.

Rolling in after 3:30 p.m. Friday from his delivery route, Campagna initially didn't want to be interviewed; humbly preferring it all would just be brushed under the rug.

"It's the right thing to do. You would hope anybody would do that in that situation," Campagna said.

When Campagna was asked if the package had shown up later that afternoon, would Bloom still have been OK, he said "from what they tell me, no."

Bloom was quickly on her way to recovery after she was treated by Beachwood paramedics. She was fully recovered by Friday and her family is extremely grateful.

"The timing of it, somebody coming to the door with a package and saw my mother in distress, and he knew right away to call 911,” said Edward Bloom. "He's just terrific. I wish I could meet him and just shake his hand."

"No thank you needed. I have family too and would hope someone would do that for them," Campagna said.