A man has opened up about what it feels like to be dead after he suffered a heart attack and was “dead for 90 minutes”. 

Alistair Blake had gone on a 45km bike ride and spent time with his wife Melinda before heading to bed. 

About 3.10am the next day, Melinda woke up her husband because of the gurgling sounds he was making. 

“She’s a light sleeper and woke to me gurgling,” Alistair told news.com.au’s I’ve Got News For You podcast.

“She grabbed her mobile phone and dialled triple-0 to get a hold of the ambulance and they instructed her to take me off the bed to be able to do CPR.

“She did CPR for 20 minutes … then the paramedics turned up. They did CPR and hit me with the defib. Apparently, it was something in excess of 10 to 12 times.”

Things began to look dire for Alistair, with police telling Melinda to prepare for the worst as it was unlikely that he would survive. 

Paramedics however continued to work on Alistair for 90 minutes in hopes of restarting his heart and in a miraculous turn of events, managed to find a pulse just moments before they were going to give up. 

A week later, Alistair woke up at Frankston Hospital in Victoria with no signs of brain injury following the severe heart attack. 

Three years on, Alistair recalls the terrifying moment in which he was considered dead for an hour and a half. 

“I remember going to bed on the Saturday night – and the next thing I remember was waking up Thursday morning on a trolley going from ICU to coronary care,” he said. 

“The human brain has totally blocked out what happened in between.

“A lot of people ask me if I saw anything, and no, I did not see anything. No bright lights, nothing like that whatsoever.”

Image: NZ Herald