A California mom found herself delivering her baby in a parking garage, surrounded by an impromptu team of helpers. Madison Fritter’s dramatic birth at UC Davis Medical Center in Sacramento is a story this family won’t soon forget. Madison and her husband, Michael, had just pulled into the hospital,  when the mom-to-be realized her baby boy was not waiting any longer.

“He was coming out,” she said. “Michael ran looking for help and her sister Zoi Jones was there to help her, a man named Dave appeared. “He had these massive hands. I was so weak and he was so strong,” Madison said.

He was a godsend.”

Within minutes, on a pile of blankets on the garage floor, Madison gave birth to an 8 lb., 2-oz baby boy. “The baby came out crying right away,” she says. “I didn’t even push.” Dave, a hospital employee who never gave his full name, offered a sweater to wrap up the newborn. At the same time, off-duty nurse Jenna Ricks, who was at the hospital with her own 2-week-old baby, heard someone yell for a shoelace.

The Fritter family with their newest addition. Photo courtesy of the family

“There’s only one thing in the medical world that you need that for: to tie off an umbilical cord,” Ricks said. “I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, someone is having a baby.’” Ricks, an experienced labor and delivery nurse, immediately jumped in to help. “She was like, ‘Don’t worry everyone. I am a labor and delivery nurse,’” Madison said.

“She made sure that I wasn’t bleeding out and that my placenta was in the right place,” Madison said. “Jenna didn’t even work for that hospital. She was there for her son and was by me the whole time. She was like, ‘I’m going to make sure you’re fine when you get in and I’ll be with you.’”

Madison Fritter and her newest son, Maverick, are taken into the hospital from the parking garage where she gave birth. Photo courtesy of the family

After 15 minutes, paramedics arrived and helped Michael, a lawyer, cut the umbilical cord while Ricks took Madison into the hospital. “I told my husband, ‘Just stay with our son,’ and I went in and they delivered my placenta,” says Madison. The couple said they chose the perfect name for their son – Maverick.

Madison said that it means independence and doing things in an unconventional way. “We were very fortunate, and I say all the time — I thank my lucky stars that everything happened the way it did and that my sister got to be there … It was such a crazy miracle,” Madison said.

Sources: People | Your Basin