MIDDLEVILLE, Mich. -- A baby being brought into the world is a beautiful thing, especially for the parents. However, when nature takes its course and the mother is forced to give birth in a Starbucks parking lot, things can get a little hectic.
That's what happened to a Middleville woman last week, and on Tuesday she got to meet the first responders who helped bring her baby into the world.
"The whole day I had some mild contractions," said Jolene Tubergan. "We were driving down M-37 to M-6 and the contractions were really, really, really bad."
So they pulled over into a Starbucks parking lot near Kalamazoo Avenue and M-6. They didn't know it then, but baby Miles wasn't going to be born in a hospital.
Instead, he arrived in a Ford Fiesta.
"I was terrified for Jolene," said her husband Mitchel. "I couldn't do anything for her, I didn't now how to comfort her and I had no idea what to do."
Firefighter Brian Johnson from the Cutlerville Fire Department did know what to do, and got to the scene in just three-and-a-half minutes.
"Luckily I was kind of refreshed because me and my wife had our child two weeks ago, so that was a really good refresher for me," Johnson said.
Except this time he was delivering the baby, and there was one very scary moment.
"Both of us were holding him and saying 'c'mon buddy' and he was just limp."
That's when EMT Eric Daniels stepped in to help.
"Brian handed Miles off to me right away and I went back to the truck and cleared out his airway and suctioned him and breathed for him for several minutes," Daniels said.
The family reunited with Johnson and Daniels on Tuesday to thank them. They also got to chat on speaker phone with another EMT who was in training at the time of the incident who actually helped inspire their child's name.
"Miles was one of three names we were trying to decide between and come to find out one of the EMT's was training, his name was Miles," Mitchel said.
