After being away from school for more than two months, Chloe Aranha is so excited to be back in her Grade 4 classroom at St. Thomas Aquinas Elementary Junior High in south Edmonton.
She’s back to a routine that one felt so ordinary before Oct. 3, 2025.
It was the last day of school before the teachers’ strike. Chloe was playing volleyball with friends when she collapsed during morning recess.
“At about 10:30 a.m., one of our Grade 4 teachers came running in and she said: ‘we have an emergency, we need you outside right away,’” said athletic lead Eric Motut, who was teaching Grade 8 physical education.
He dropped everything and sprinted down a hallway leading to one of the doors outside.
“I found her face down on the ground,” Motut said.
Chloe wasn’t breathing and he couldn’t feel a pulse. He started administering CPR.
“In that moment, I’ve never been more locked in into anything. Everything around me didn’t exist. Just Chloe and what I needed to do.
“It just felt like I had a purpose and a job.”
Other colleagues jumped to action, calling 911 and retrieving one of the school’s defibrillators.
Therapeutic assistant Ainsley Dillion applied the paddles and shocked Chloe’s little body twice.
“I think we were there at the right time, at the right place, and we had the training that we needed,” Dillion said.
Chloe was rushed to the Stollery Children’s Hospital, where doctors praised the school staff for doing everything right and saving the child’s life.
“There’s nothing we can do to repay them,” says Chloe’s father Russel Aranha.
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“How do you repay them for something that is priceless for you?”
Motut will never forget the moment he found out Chloe was going to live.
“It was probably one of the happiest moments of my life,” he said.
The nine-year-old spent three days in an induced coma.
She was later diagnosed with CPVT — catecholaminergic polymorphic ventricular tachycardia — a rare condition that causes the heart to beat too fast.
Adrenaline from stress and exercise can trigger it — that’s what caused her cardiac arrest.
When she was well enough, Dillon and Motut visited her in hospital.
“She was so excited to see them, and they were hugging.” said Chloe’s mother, Shalini Mathias.
“They helped me. They saved my life,” Chloe said.
The family finally got to say thank you to their daughter’s lifesavers in person in November.
“There wasn’t a dry eye in the room,” Ananha said. “Here we got to meet our real-life heroes and show gratitude for what they did for us and for our family.”
Chloe Aranha in hospital, being visited by Eric Motut and Ainsley Dillion after they saved her life at school on Oct. 3, 2025.
Supplied
In early December, Chloe was able to return to school.
“I miss(ed) my friends. I miss(ed) my teacher too,” Chloe said.
The road to recovery has been difficult. Chloe has had to relearn how to eat, walk and talk.
“Her positivity and her attitude really made sure she got back to where she wanted to be,” Dillon said.
“She’s doing phenomenally.”
Last month, Motut and Dillon’s heroic actions were recognized inside the Alberta legislature.
Chloe’s family and the school staff hope her story sparks important conversations around access to defibrillators in schools as well as regular training, to make sure no one hesitates when seconds matter most.
Defibrillators are not mandatory in Alberta schools, but the Edmonton Catholic School Board has AED’s in all of its facilities.
“She’s alive because of that. Because of their courage and because of their training,” Mathias said.
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