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Sheri Rapisarda will never forget the first time someone died when she was on the scene.

With her own heart racing, the 22-year-old’s training kicked in. She started chest compressions on the 73-year-old man in cardiac arrest and used an automatic defibrillator in hopes of bringing back a pulse.

“When I saw he had blood pressure, I was over the moon,” Rapisarda said. “So when we took him out of his house and in the ambulance, he was OK.”

Rapisarda, an emergency medical technician with Collier County’s Emergency Medical Services since 2001, was beside herself.

“I was ecstatic,” she said. “I called my mom the next day.”

Rapisarda and 29 colleagues with EMS and from other local fire and rescue agencies were honored by the Collier County Commission on Tuesday with Phoenix awards for successfully bringing individuals back to life after cardiac arrest and death. The phoenix is a mythical bird that died and rose from its ashes.

“It was my first save,” Rapisarda said of that day in March when she was dispatched to the man’s home in North Naples. At the hospital that day, the emergency room physicians pointed her out to the man’s wife.

“She came up and hugged me and cried,” Rapisarda said, who doesn’t know the man’s name or how is doing today. “I knew he left the hospital alive.”

ERIK KELLAR / Daily News

Austin Green, left, a city of Naples firefighter, is congratulated by his mother, Martha Green, after he was awarded the Phoenix Award at the Collier County Commissioners’ chamber Tuesday. The Phoenix Awards are given to those people in emergency services in Collier County who have saved someone’s life. The award was bestowed on 30 men and women in the various rescue and law enforcement agencies in the county.

Steve Kofsky, a firefighter with Naples Police and Emergency Services, likewise received his first Phoenix award Tuesday after 11 years on the job.

He and colleagues brought back to life a man last summer who had gone into cardiac arrest and died, but they brought him back at his house in the Parkshore Drive area.

“The gentleman had surgery on his knee and wasn’t feeling well,” Kofsky said of the call.

After he and a firefighter colleague, Austin Green, arrived at the scene, the man went into cardiac arrest and had no vital signs. They brought him back to life in the ambulance on the way to the hospital with a defibrillator shock, intravenous fluid and cardiopulmonary resuscitation.

“By the time we got to the hospital, he was conscious,” Green said.

“He was talking again to us by the time we pulled up to the hospital,” Kofsky said, adding that he is proud of the achievement. “I feel proud to do what I do.”

Others recognized with Phoenix awards from EMS are Dan Wilcox, Marc Matthews, Mindi Weissman, Melanie Heweker, Michele Williamson, Mike Cossick, Michael Sullivan, Rich Humberger, and John Poczynski. Honored from the Collier County Sheriff’s Office are Carol Nimnuan and Christopher Knott; and Kevin Schoch and Brian Heath from the Golden Gate Fire Department. Fourteen members of the North Naples Fire Department received Phoenix awards — Ted Bath, Brett Jameyson, Kris Thomas, Frank Sands, Tony St. Louis, Matt Barry, Jason McCormick, Michele Delaney, Art Rodriguez, Dana McGregor, James Varon, Scott Leonard, Dale Grubbs and Jodie VanSickle.