KATHMANDU: The Himalaya Airlines said crew of its Doha-Kathmandu flight found a man collapsing after an epileptic attack, at the Hamad International Airport in Doha, and provided him with lifesaving first aid including cardiopulmonary resuscitation in the wee hours of Thursday morning.

Paramedics arrived later and rushed him to a hospital for treatment.

Later, it was discovered he was a Nepali national as he had carried a boarding pass of the same flight (H9556) to Kathmandu that his saviours belonged to, according to officials at the Himalaya Airlines in Kathmandu.

The man has been identified as 21-year-old Niranjan Patel, whose permanent address in Nepal is yet to be known. He is currently admitted to a Hamad Medical Corporation hospital for treatment.

Patel is said to be a Nepali migrant worker returning home from Qatar on the eve of Deepawali and Chhath festivals after two years.

“We were proceeding for immigration clearance at around 1:00 am when we spotted a man lying on the ground, surrounded by security personnel,” Manish Singh, the purser of flight H9556, said.

With epileptic seizures, Patel was lying on the floor for five minutes or so for want of medical assistance. He suffered from laboured breathing when the Himalaya Airlines crew came across him.

The Airport’s medical team was yet to arrive so with the permission of the flight captain (Ramesh Krishnan), according to Singh, his team started assessing the hapless man’s condition.

“His blood pressure was very high when we started providing the first aid. But, pulse as well as blood pressure abruptly went down,” Singh said, “He had stopped breathing at one point of time, and his nails started turning bluish.”

According to Singh, he himself started the CPR and it saved his life. Paramedics arrived 10 minutes later and took him to the hospital.

According to the Himalaya Airlines, the cabin crew, led by Singh, included Rabi Ghising, Yuwraj Rizal, Tara Devi Pun, Ranjita Mahanka, and Sakshyam Shrestha.