PORTLAND, Ore. -- When crowds started running away from the scene during the brutal MAX train stabbings on Friday, Michael Kennedy ran toward it.
Kennedy, a former paramedic, was there on the train, one car away. He sprung into action and started helping Rick Best, one of the two victims who passed away.
"I realized that he wasn't breathing anymore and we were checking for a pulse and couldn't feel one. I started doing chest compressions on him," Kennedy said.
Kennedy said it was unlike anything he'd seen in his life.
"I've seen people getting killed before, I've seen car wrecks. I've seen all that. I have never seen or been prepared for two men getting knifed down in an attack," he said.
Kennedy was on his way home Friday night, his normal commute. "Two times a day," he said. "Five days a week."
Just as he always does, Kennedy rode home in the second car. All seemed normal until he heard the operator.
"The max operator said, 'If you don't knock it off in the first car, I'm calling the cops,' " he said.
Kennedy said he wasn't too fazed. Then he heard a second warning. Suddenly, the train stopped and people in the first car started running.
"First thing I thought was we're sitting ducks here," he said. "You know the Spanish train bombings a few years ago, the London tube bombings. I was like, 'Well we're just kind of stuck here.' "
Kennedy, now a water quality specialist who used to be a paramedic, pushed concerns aside and went running to the first car.
"What I first saw was the bloody tracks and blood flowing out of the door," he said. "Then I saw him. Then on the other side of Tiliasin [Myrddin Namkai Meche] was Ricky [Best]."
Kennedy knew it was bad. He said both men had their throats slit near the carotid artery. Best appeared to be in worse shape, so Kennedy, inside that train, knelt beside him and worked to clear his airways.
Then he started performing CPR.
"It felt like a really, really long time," Kennedy said. "You count when you do compressions. I counted to 100 many, many times."
Eventually firefighters arrived at the scene, confirming what Kennedy already knew. Rick Best, a veteran and city employee who was attacked for standing up again hate, was gone.
Taliesin Namkai Meche died at the hospital. Micah Fletcher is expected to survive.
Kennedy said he hasn't slept since.
On Sunday, he wanted to share two messages. First and foremost, to Best's family.
"He was surrounded by people who were soothing him and caring for him," he said. "He did not die alone."
Second, Kennedy has a message to and about the man charged with this horrific attack.
"I worry about the hundreds of people who are impacted like this. And I hope that it is labeled what it is. It was a terrorist attack. I want that to be clear," Kennedy said.
We reached out to Best's family today and spoke via phone to his 19-year-old son.
He said the family is requesting privacy, but wanted people to hear a phrase his dad said a lot during his life.
"I can't stand by and do nothing."