Paris Nurse Discovers The Man He Tried To Save Was Suicide Bomber

A CUSTOMER LIKE OTHERS

David, 46, who works at a Paris hospital, knows the Comptoir Voltaire well, living in the neighborhood.

He had been having dinner with a friend that Friday night. When the waitress brought their dishes, the explosion went off.

"There was a huge flame, there was dust," he said. "I immediately thought it was the heaters. I screamed, 'cut off the gas'. There was panic, people started running out ... I left the dining area and went on to the terrace."

He first helped a woman, then a young man lying on a table, conscious but bleeding. A helper took over and David went to Abdeslam. "At this point, I never thought he was a suicide bomber, he was a customer like everyone else," he said. "I thought that after the gas explosion, he must have gotten hurt."

David says he did not see Abdeslam walk into the restaurant. He believes he had been sitting at the terrace when he detonated the bomb.

"He had a large opening on his side, about 30 cms (11.8 inches)," he said. "When you lift a t-shirt and you see wires, you know that's not normal."

David says police told him that Abdeslam's bomb had not fully exploded.

"(Later), I was thinking about how I lay him on the floor, with me doing CPR. It's a pretty vigourous process. By just doing that, I also could have been gone," he said.

(Reporting By Marie-Louise Gumuchian and Pauline Mevel; Editing by Andrew Callus and Ian Geoghegan)

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