Friday, January 05, 2007
On Track Betting
For those who might not have heard about this yet, this is perhaps one of the most inspirational goodwill stories to come around in some time.
Fifty-year old Navy vet and construction worker Wesley Autrey managed to save a man going through a seizure -- not once, but twice. The second time, he covered the stricken man's body with his as they lay between subway rail tracks as an oncoming train ended up screeching to a halt above them.
Autrey managed to keep enough presence of mind to tell the milling crowd on the subway platform to shut up enough so his four and six-year old daughters could be told that their dad was alright.
Autrey is now, appropriately, the toast of the town -- lauded by Mayor Bloomberg at City Hall, invited onto David Letterman and Ellen DeGeneres; Donald Trump sent him a check for $10,000; the MTA has given him a year of free Metro cards, etc.
However, the best part of the story is Autrey's spiritual selflessness in addition to his physical heroism: Without any prompting, he has said several times that he's not a hero: He says the men and women over in Iraq, "fighting to give us the opportunity to be able to save someone's life here" (paraphrasing his comments on Letterman Thursday night), are the true heroes.
Anyway, for those looking for good news, you can't hope for much better than this to kick off the new year.
UPDATE: Clip from Autrey's appearance on Letterman is here.
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Fifty-year old Navy vet and construction worker Wesley Autrey managed to save a man going through a seizure -- not once, but twice. The second time, he covered the stricken man's body with his as they lay between subway rail tracks as an oncoming train ended up screeching to a halt above them.
Autrey managed to keep enough presence of mind to tell the milling crowd on the subway platform to shut up enough so his four and six-year old daughters could be told that their dad was alright.
Autrey is now, appropriately, the toast of the town -- lauded by Mayor Bloomberg at City Hall, invited onto David Letterman and Ellen DeGeneres; Donald Trump sent him a check for $10,000; the MTA has given him a year of free Metro cards, etc.
However, the best part of the story is Autrey's spiritual selflessness in addition to his physical heroism: Without any prompting, he has said several times that he's not a hero: He says the men and women over in Iraq, "fighting to give us the opportunity to be able to save someone's life here" (paraphrasing his comments on Letterman Thursday night), are the true heroes.
Anyway, for those looking for good news, you can't hope for much better than this to kick off the new year.
UPDATE: Clip from Autrey's appearance on Letterman is here.
Labels: New York City, Wesley Autrey
