Gander Opens Its Doors

When American airspace closed on September 11, 2001, 38 airliners were sent to the little town of Gander, Newfoundland. Almost overnight a town of about 10,000 people, with only around 500 hotel rooms, was hosting roughly 6,700 stranded travelers. The mayor said they were going to take people in when they had nowhere to go, because that’s just the way they are. Churches, schools, and halls opened up, folks brought blankets and food, and volunteers worked around the clock for five days. Lifelong friendships came out of it.

Saman Kunan’s Last Dive

In the summer of 2018, twelve boys and their soccer coach were trapped deep in a flooded cave in northern Thailand. Saman Kunan had already left the Thai navy, but he came back to volunteer in the rescue. His job was to carry air tanks into the cave for the boys and the other divers. On the way back out, he ran out of air himself, lost consciousness, and died. The rescue went on, and days later every one of the boys and their coach made it out alive.

Desmond Doss: One More Man

Desmond Doss joined the Army in World War II as a combat medic, but as a Seventh-day Adventist he had vowed he would never kill, so he refused to carry a gun. A lot of the men in his unit mocked him for it. Then at Okinawa in 1945, his company had to climb a steep cliff that came to be called Hacksaw Ridge, and Doss stayed in the line of fire and got some 75 wounded soldiers to safety. One of the men who had shamed him later called him one of the bravest people alive. President Truman awarded him the Medal of Honor in 1945.