If it wasn't for Showdown 59, Fulham grandmother Raelene Schirripa wouldn't be alive today.

On May 1, as 53,045 fans streamed into Adelaide Oval, Raelene and her husband Douglas made their way to the Crows chairman's event in the western stand.

The couple are longtime supporters of the club, both on and off the field.

They took a lift to level three, when Raelene, 82, said she wasn't feeling well.

At 5.58pm, just outside the doors to the pre-game event, she went into cardiac arrest.

"She just melted in my arms, like butter melting," Douglas, 81, says. "She didn't fall, she didn't stumble, she melted, it was instant. I got down on my knees just to hold her head from banging on the ground."

He caught her, but Raelene's heart stopped beating on the cold concrete concourse of Adelaide Oval. She was clinically dead when a security contractor radioed for help moments later.

Within two minutes, three young St John Ambulance volunteers were by her side.

The medics – Tom Abdelmalek, 19, Lara Kanie and Emma-Jane Russell, both 21 – knew that every second counted.

"Everything we had trained for was muscle memory in that moment," Lara says. "We could see how critical it was, and we immediately focused on what needed to happen next."

St John Ambulance SA operations team leader Nick Hughes, also a paramedic, says they did everything right.

"They realised very quickly that Raelene was in cardiac arrest, started CPR, applied a defibrillator and delivered one shock," Nick says. "Our advanced life support guys came within four to six minutes of the initial call. In amongst all that, one of the crews called SA Ambulance and activated them."

As the crews fought to save Raelene's life, Adelaide Oval staff sprang into action. Giant privacy screens were erected, gates were opened to allow the ambulances through, crowds were cleared and lifts were held to ensure paramedics could reach Raelene as quickly as possible.

Fans were diverted around the rescue effort as Crows staff comforted Douglas.

"They took me to one side, got a chair, sat me down and stayed with me the whole time," Douglas says. "I was sitting about 2m away from Raelene. I couldn't see but they were working on her. I was feeling a bit helpless, but I knew she was in the best hands."

And against the odds, those hands brought Raelene back to life.

She wasn't conscious but she was alive.

"Our crews continued working on Raelene and achieved what we call return of spontaneous circulation, or ROSC, meaning her heart had restarted, was generating a pulse and circulating blood around her body again," Nick says. "Her heart was beating again before the first SA Ambulance Service crew arrived."

Douglas Schirripa hugs St John Ambulance volunteer Tom Abdelmalek, one of the crew who saved his wife Raelene's life at Adelaide Oval. Picture: Brett Hartwig

SA Ambulance paramedic intern Holly Fiedler says teamwork was key.

"Obviously Raelene was very lucky to have St John there first because every minute makes a difference," Holly says. "We all worked together. It's quite rare to have a good outcome from something like this but it's super rewarding. This is why I want to be in this job."

Raelene was rushed to the Royal Adelaide Hospital where the couple's three children, David, Marc and Rachel, arrived minutes later.

"She was all wired up, the nurses put their arms around my daughter and my younger son because he was in tears," Douglas says. "The doctor explained everything. He said, 'prepare for the worst, we're not sure she'll make it'."

But she did make it. And after three days in intensive care, Raelene regained consciousness.

"My daughter rang me and said, 'Mum's opened her eyes'," Douglas says. "That meant she was fighting. It makes me quite emotional to think about it."

Four months on, Raelene has made a remarkable recovery thanks to a wireless pacemaker that sits at the bottom of her heart. She spent a month in hospital, including two weeks in a cardiac ward, and while she doesn't remember collapsing, she's happily returned to Adelaide Oval twice since.

Douglas knows that if his wife of 60 years had been anywhere else that night, he would have lost her.

"If she'd stayed home by herself, she'd be dead," he says. "If it had happened in the traffic, she'd be dead. She was gone, she'd stopped breathing and those volunteers were there within two minutes doing something. I'm just so thankful. I'm so proud of and thankful for the great efforts of all at Adelaide Oval."

Nick Hughes says training ensured Raelene's rescue was brilliantly executed.

"It's different to traditional ambulance work where you might go into someone's lounge room," he says. "We're typically dealing with dense crowds of 50,000 people in awkward spaces so definitely the training is a key factor."

He says everyone played their role to perfection. "Someone in cardiac arrest is as serious as it gets," he says. "We're never trying to be heroes. Our staff and volunteers are there just to help people. Our team simply did what we're trained to do. But what means the most to us is knowing there's now an Adelaide family that still has their wife, their mother and loved one with them and we just played a small part in that."

At the heart of the co-ordinated response is a central venue control space, making Adelaide Oval one of the best and safest places to be if anything goes wrong. SA Ambulance Service, St John Ambulance, Adelaide Oval and SA Police staff monitor all medical and crowd safety issues from the room.

Adelaide Oval chief executive Nick Addison says help is always there if it's needed. "Extensive preparation and training sits behind every event at Adelaide Oval and we have strong systems in place to help us respond to incidents quickly," he says. "Ultimately though, it's our people and their unwavering commitment to the safety and wellbeing of our fans that really makes the difference."

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Showdown 59 will be forever remembered for Brayden Cook's goal in the final seconds that secured the Crows a thrilling 1-point win. But for the Schirripa family, the biggest win came before the first bounce – when a group of people who refused to give up saved a much-loved wife, mother and grandmother.