The miracle of Libby Claire

LAKE WYLIE, S.C. Libby Claire McGarity toddled down the aisle at River Hills Community Church last Sunday to a standing ovation.

Libby Claire, 31 inches tall and 21 months old, began clapping, too. Her mother and father, who is a minister at the church, lifted her up when they got to the sanctuary. Libby Claire rested her hands on the lectern the way she had seen her daddy do it, looked out at the congregation and said:

“Hi!”

Matt and Elizabeth McGarity never imagined five weeks ago they would return to their church in celebration. They feared it would be for Libby Claire's funeral.

She fell from a loft at a beach house in Longboat Key, Fla., on July 10, taking the impact on the front of her skull and brain. Doctors at All Children's Hospital in St. Petersburg, where she was airlifted, warned Matt and Elizabeth to prepare for the worst. Her skull had cut an artery in her brain. She had lost so much blood and her heart was so weak, they would operate without anesthesia.

This is going to be very risky, Matt remembers one doctor saying. If she dies on the operating table….

Matt heard nothing else the doctor said, only those words: If she dies on the operating table….

Matt and Elizabeth prayed. They prayed God would guide the surgeon's hands. They prayed God would strengthen Libby Claire's body, hold her when they couldn't and whisper words of comfort.

Once during surgery, and once after, they said, Libby Claire nearly died. The swelling in her brain was so severe, doctors put her into a coma.

“You find yourself staring over her bed,” Matt said, “staring at her, watching the numbers.”

And wondering: Would she ever wake?

A test of faith

A week before the accident, before they drove south to Florida for vacation with their four children, before all their lives changed, Matt had preached the Sunday morning sermon at River Hills Community Church. He spoke from Matthew 7:24, about a wise man who built his house on a rock foundation.

Storms, Matt preached, will come to test the foundations of our lives and will reveal whether a person's faith is built on rock or on sand.

Libby Claire's accident was the first real test of Matt's and Elizabeth's faith. Matt is 31. Elizabeth is 29 and expecting their fifth child. They both grew up in Charlotte and have been married 10 years.

“I always felt that if something traumatic happened to my children, I would falter and question God and wonder how this could happen to an innocent child,” Elizabeth said. “But it really has amazed me, the presence of God literally uplifting us. It has changed our faith and made it deeper.”

Every morning in the hospital, they chose a different Bible verse. Psalm 121:7-8. Joshua 1-9. Psalm 91.

Back home, friends and strangers prayed for Libby Claire. The Rev. Bruce Jones, senior pastor at River Hills Community Church, said the accident united parishioners in a way nothing else has. If you drive through Fort Mill and Clover, S.C., the pink ribbons you'll see on mailboxes and front porches are for Libby Claire. Around the world, people discovered her Web site and prayed.

Learning to receive

In the weeks following the accident, Matt and Elizabeth learned how to receive rather than give.

“We hope that no one ever has to go through a traumatic experience like this,” Elizabeth said, “but I wish that everyone could feel the outpouring of love.”

The accident made them aware on a deeper, more intimate level what parents go through when a child is hurt. Matt has often given blood, but now when he gives it he will think of the 11 strangers who donated the 11 pints of blood that kept Libby Claire alive. He said he will always put money in the collection box to support the Ronald McDonald houses where families can stay when they have a child in an out-of-town hospital.

And when Matt and Elizabeth minister to families, they said, they will better understand the pain.

“We know how the ambulance ride feels, how the medevac feels, how the surgery feels, how the waiting feels,” Elizabeth said. “We have a whole new heart for people with sick and injured children.”

Counting the days

The sixth day after surgery, doctors began slowly lifting Libby Claire from her coma.

On the ninth day, Elizabeth and Matt got to hold her, still so medicated she didn't seem like their little girl.

The neurosurgeon delivered good news on the 10th day: Libby Claire was pulling through. He didn't expect lingering problems. Matt said the surgeon told them she would have withdrawal symptoms and struggle to learn how to sit up, move and talk again. It might take a year. She would need one more surgery, to replace a piece of skull removed when her brain became so swollen.

A medevac plane flew them on the 15th day, July 24, to Levine Children's Hospital in Charlotte.

On the 18th day, Libby Claire smiled.

The next morning, she smiled with her whole body: She shrugged her shoulders, squinted her eyes and opened her mouth in a wide grin.

On July 30, the 21st day, Matt and Elizabeth took her home.

The return of Libby Claire

Each day since, a different piece of Libby Claire emerged, surprising Matt and Elizabeth and confounding her caregivers. Her eyes sparkled. She walked. She climbed onto her plastic push-car. The next day, she rode around on it. Thursday, she ran for the first time.

“I've talked about miracles in life, and there's no other way to explain this,” Matt said. “Oftentimes we seem to always look for the supernatural. I think God also works miracles through his people, through medicine, and it's not always that flash of lightning. Sometimes we underestimate what a miracle truly is. I think we need to stop and see the miracles that happen every day.”

As Matt and Elizabeth held Libby Claire aloft last Sunday before the congregation, Matt declared:

“Behold a miracle!”

The Ashley Smith case

On March 11, 2005 Brian Nichols killed several people during an escape from custody at Atlanta’s Fulton County Courthouse. He ultimately forced his way into Ashley Smith's apartment. In an unexpected move, after more than 7 hours of being held hostage, Nichols allowed her to leave her complex upon her claim to visit her daughter. Smith took the opportunity to dial local authorities who summoned the Gwinnett County, Georgia, S.W.A.T. team, who eventually arrested him upon an uneventful surrender.

During her ordeal, Smith read to Nichols from the Bible and from Rick Warren's The Purpose Driven Life. She also cooked him pancakes and gave him crystal methamphetamine, an illegal stimulant, from her personal supply, although she maintains that she did not use the drug along with him. Smith later revealed "that she had been struggling with a methamphetamine addiction when she was taken hostage, and the drug problem had even led to time spent in a psychiatric hospital and the loss of custody of her 5-year-old daughter."^[3] Smith said the last time she used crystal meth "was 36 hours before Nichols held a gun to her and entered her home. Nichols wanted her to use the drug with him, but she refused.” Smith also revealed that she had “a five-inch scar down the center of her torso — the aftermath of a car wreck caused by drug-induced psychosis. She says she let go of the steering wheel when she heard a voice saying, ‘Let go and let God.’

Miracle in the Mines

Three miners survived 25 days trapped in a flooded mine in southern China by drinking dirty water and chewing coal before rescuers burrowed through a collapsed tunnel to reach them, a local official and state media said Monday.
The men and 13 others became stuck when the Xinqiao Coal Mine flooded June 17. On Sunday, rescue workers digging into the mountainside cleared a path to the miners and saw their lights, which still gave off a dim glow, said Wang Guangneng, a Communist Party spokesman in the Guizhou province county of Qinglong.
The miners stayed alive by drinking water that seeped through the earth, Wang said. The official Xinhua News Agency cited a rescuer saying that oxygen was also able to get into the tunnel easily.
They also chewed on coal to stave off their appetite, the Guiyang Evening News, based in the provincial capital, reported.
It was not clear whether the men had any information on the others still missing. Rescuers had found the body of one miner a week after the flooding, the official Xinhua News Agency said.
A Xinhua photo showed one of the rescued miners, Wang Kuangwei, his bones prominent through his skin, getting medical attention Sunday, with his eyes covered to protect them from the light. The party spokesman said the three men were in stable condition.
During an interview with Shenzhen Media Group television, one of the miners, 36-year old Zhao Weixing, who was lying down with his eyes and face covered, told reporters: "I feel OK."
The miners' rescue after 604 hours underground was a rare tale of survival in China's coal mines, the world's deadliest, where an average of 13 workers are killed every day. Most accidents are blamed on failures to follow safety rules, including a lack of required ventilation or fire control equipment.
In August 2007, two brothers were forced to chew on coal and sip their own urine from discarded water bottles after nearly six days in a mine tunnel. They even managed to crack jokes during that time about their wives remarrying after they were declared dead.
In Sunday's rescue, the miners — all of whom were from central Henan province — were found 500 to 600 yards (meters) from the entrance to the mine shaft, on a level intersection that protected them from the flood, the Beijing Youth Daily newspaper reported. The ceiling had collapsed, blocking a path to the tunnel opening.
The county's head of work safety, Li Xingwei, was digging a channel into the mountain and found an unblocked pathway, then noticed the miners' lights, the newspaper said.
"We crept along the tunnel in excitement," Xinhua news agency quoted him as saying.
Rescuers shouted to the men to remain calm, the Beijing Youth Daily report said.
Once rescued, it said, the miners did nothing but ask for water.

Lone Survivor

A young girl believed to be the only survivor of an Indian Ocean plane crash flew back to Paris from the Comoros Islands on Thursday to the waiting arms of her father.

Bahia Bakari, 14, returned to France on a plane carrying a government minister and other French officials. The Falcon-900 jet with medical facilities aboard left the archipelago nation of the Comoros, a former French colony, and arrived at Le Bourget airport just north of Paris.

Yemenia Flight 626 crashed Tuesday morning off Comoros amid heavy winds, and Bahia, described by her father as a fragile girl who could barely swim, spent over 13 hours in the water clinging to plane wreckage before she was rescued.

The other 152 people on the plane, including her mother, are presumed dead. It is not clear that Bahia knows her mother is dead because her uncle who visited her Wednesday at a Comoros hospital was too heartbroken to break the news. Instead, he told Bahia that her mother was also recovering.

Bahia's father, Kassim, met the plane, saying he was relieved and overjoyed to see his daughter even as he mourned his wife.

"It was very powerful," he said of his reunion with Bahia. He said he asked her,"'How are you? Was the return trip OK?' ... We joked a little, the two of us."

Several other family members joined the airport reunion before an ambulance took the girl to the Armand-Trousseau Children's Hospital in eastern Paris.

"In the midst of the mourning, there is Bahia. It is a miracle, it is an absolutely extraordinary battle for survival," France's government minister for cooperation, Alain Joyandet, said at a news conference at the airport.

Bahia, the eldest of four children, had boarded a plane in Paris with her mother, Aziza, on Monday morning for a long journey via Marseille and San'a, Yemen, to Comoros where they planned to spend part of the summer school holidays with relatives. Her three siblings had stayed behind with her father.

When found hanging on to a piece of the plane, Bahia was suffering from hypothermia, a broken collarbone and bruises to her face, her elbow and her foot.

Joyandet said the girl recounted her ordeal a bit to him.

"She says instructions were given to passengers and that then she felt something like electricity ... as if she had been a bit electrocuted," Joyandet said. "And suddenly there was this big sound. She found herself in the water — and you know the rest."

The minister praised her strength and courage.

"It's an enormous message that she sends to the world ... almost nothing is impossible," said Joyandet, who accompanied the girl back to France. "We will do everything we can to help her."

He noted that 152 other people on the plane are still missing and vowed "the Comoros and France are arm-in-arm to find out everything that happened."

Off the coast of the Comoros islands, French and U.S. ships directed the search for survivors, bodies and plane wreckage Thursday, even as hope in finding anyone alive in the choppy seas faded.

"Up to this moment, there have been no bodies, nor any other survivor," said Jean Youssouf, director-general of El Maarouf Hospital in Moroni. "Do we continue to hope to find survivors? Yes, we will continue to hope."

In the coastal town of Mitsamiouli, about 19 miles (30 kilometers) from Moroni, the capital of Comoros, rescue boats went to sea. Dozens of Red Crescent tents were set up on shore and about 100 French, American, Yemeni and Comoran military personnel gathered to aid the search effort.

Ramoulati Ben Ali, a spokeswoman for the Red Crescent Society of Comoros, said because of the "the wind, the rough sea, we have not been able to recover any bodies."

A 16-member U.S. search-and-rescue team arrived in Moroni late Wednesday after being asked to come by the Comoros government, a U.S. diplomat said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.

He declined to give further details.

The French air accident investigation agency BEA was sending a team of investigators and Airbus experts to Comoros, an archipelago of three main islands 1,800 miles (2,900 kilometers) south of Yemen, between Africa's southeastern coast and the island of Madagascar.

A respected pilots group, the London-based International Federation of Air Line Pilots Association, said the plane may have been attempting a go-around in rough weather for another approach when it hit the sea.

Vatican looking into Kan. miracle

A Vatican investigator is headed to this Kansas town to look into whether the recovery of an area man was a bona fide miracle.

Andrea Ambrosi will arrive in Wichita on Friday and then travel northwest to Colwich. He is coming from Rome to investigate on behalf of the Catholic Church whether 20-year-old Chase Kear survived a severe head injury last year in part because his friends and family successfully prayed to Rev. Emil Kapaun.

Kapaun, a U.S. Army chaplain who died in the Korean War, grew up in Pilsen, Kan.

The Rev. John Hotze, the judicial vicar for the Wichita diocese, said Ambrosi, a lawyer by training, will thoroughly “and skeptically” investigate Kear’s case.

The church requires miracles before elevating them to sainthood.

Hotze has spent eight years investigating the proposed sainthood of Kapaun. The church has considered making Kapaun a saint for much longer, ever since soldiers came out of prisoner-of-war camps in 1953 with tales of Kapaun’s heroism and faith.

Kapaun would be only the third American-born person to be canonized as a saint. The church requires that at least one and possibly two miracles be proven on Kapaun’s behalf, depending on whether Kapaun died a martyr.

Ambrosi will speak with Kear’s neurosurgeon, Raymond Grundmeyer, who told The Wichita Eagle in an e-mail that he believes Kear’s survival was miraculous.

Even if Ambrosi agrees, the church will still have to evaluate the case. But for the many hoping the church will canonize Kapaun, it will represent another step forward.

“There is no doubt in anyone’s mind in our family that Father Kapaun helped save our son,” said Paula Kear, Kear’s mother. “We were told at least three or four times in those first two days that Chase wasn’t going to make it.”

Kear, a member of the Hutchinson Community College track team, fell on his head during pole vaulting practice in October. He was airlifted to a Wichita hospital.

His family began frantically praying as the helicopter landed. Within an hour, his sister, Linda Wapelhorst, asked a priest at the hospital to perform the Catholic sacrament of anointing the sick, which used to be called last rites.

She also called the Sacred Heart Church in Colwich and asked that people there pray to Kapaun for her brother’s recovery. Grundmeyer and others told the family that Kear’s prospects weren’t good as his skull was cracked from ear to ear and his brain was swelling. They said an operation to remove part of his skull or an infection that might follow would likely kill him.

His family and dozens of others said they regularly prayed to Rev. Kapaun.

Only a few weeks later, Kear walked out of a rehabilitation hospital, a result his family and some physicians said had to be a miracle. “Chase survived in part because hundreds of people prayed to Father Emil Kapaun to intercede on his behalf,” Paula Kear said.

Missing 3-year-old boy found alive

ST. LOUIS (AP/KMOV) -- A 3-year-old southeast Missouri boy missing for more than two days was found alive Wednesday afternoon three miles from his rural home.

A volunteer found Joshua Childers in the rugged terrain of the Mark Twain National Forest, Madison County Sheriff David Lewis said. The boy had slipped out of his house more than 50 hours earlier, wearing a T-shirt, sneakers and a pull-up diaper.

Joshua was taken to the Iron County Hospital in Pilot Knob at 4:42 p.m. for evaluation in the emergency room. Hospital CEO Ed Gast said the initial assessment was that the boy was in fair condition. Joshua was later transferred around 11 p.m. to Jefferson Regional Medical Center in Crystal City for further evaluation.

"The parents would like to thank everyone who has assisted in the search and treatment of Joshua and they ask that their privacy be protected at this time," Gast said.

Joshua wandered away about 11:30 a.m. Monday from his parents' home near the small, secluded town of Arcadia, about 100 miles southwest of St. Louis. The couple searched for about 45 minutes before calling police, setting off a massive search that lasted through the night and into Tuesday and Wednesday.

So many citizens wanted to help find the 35-pound boy that willing individuals were held back at the staging area, Lewis said.

"Today we brought in professional rescue people," he said. "We tried to cover everything again and widened the scope."

They searched the area by land grids and water, with dogs, divers and sonar equipment. Rain and cool temperatures worsened search conditions.

Sometime after 4 p.m. local time, the boy was found in a hollow, a creek bottom area off State Highway D, three miles from his home. He was immediately taken to the hospital, Lewis said.

He described the Mark Twain National Forest as "really rough country," consisting of steep ravines, creeks and rugged rocks.

"I'm so happy, you can't believe it," Lewis said. "I'm going to go home and take a shower and go to bed."

On Monday evening a searcher found a tennis shoe that the boy's parents confirmed he was wearing when he slipped away from home.

Lewis said the shoe was found nearly a mile from the family's mobile home in the forest.

Joshua's father works an overnight shift and was home sleeping late Monday morning. His mother was watching the child but was briefly distracted. That's when the boy got out, wearing a dark blue and green T-shirt, a pull-up diaper and tennis shoes.

Police arrived and put out a call for volunteers. Hundreds showed up -- some on horses, some on donkeys, some on all-terrain vehicles or with their own dogs to help.

"how could a 35-pound child stay alive in 40-degree weather in the rain for two nights and three days?"

Hastings College student makes a miracle recovery

By Katie Ferrell - Every year around 37,000 people are killed in car crashes.

A Hastings College student came close to becoming part of that statistic.

He crashed his car earlier this year...ending up in a coma.

Tonight in your family healthcast...News 5's Katie Ferrell tells us about his recovery and why his parents are calling it a miracle.

This is 22 year old Jason Kort a little less than 3 months ago.

"He had 6 broken ribs on his left side, his left lung was completely collapsed and his right one was deflating at that time, severe head trauma,” said Mike Kort, Jason’s dad.

A car accident on February 1st left him in a coma with a traumatic brain injury. Doctors feared he may never wake up and had little hope for a full recovery.

"We had no clue how long he would be in a coma like that. They told us it could be 3 months, it could be 6 months, he could never wake up,” said Mike.

But, this is Jason now.

A miraculous comeback his parents or doctors can not explain...After 10 days in a coma, Jason opened his eyes.

"To be honest I think I broke down and cried."

He spent 5 more weeks at 2 Lincoln Hospitals.

He has no memory of why he crashed or even most of his time in the hospital.

"I do not really remember what I did the day of the accident, I do not remember that too well,” said Jason Kort.

His only memory...a day his parents and doctors did not know he would see.

"I would say the best memory I have of being in the hospital was on my birthday, I was in the hospital for my 22nd birthday so I can remember that day."

The only physical reminders of the accident are not from the accident at all. A blood clot forced doctors to remove part of his thumb, an allergic reaction caused a slight burn on his arm and where a breathing tube once was, a small scar.

Jason calls himself lucky and said he is looking toward the future.

"Just getting back to using my hand would be the main thing and getting back the use of my thumb would be another,” said Jason.

Jason's Dr. tells the family he has no medical answers for how he has recovered so fully and quickly.

Jason's dad has his own theory.

"I looked at him and I pointed up to the heavens that was my answer... It is a miracle that is how I look at it,” said Mike.

Mike said a Lincoln nurse told him she had never seen a patient with so many visitors.

The Kort's said they attribute Jason's recovery to the prayer's and support of their family, friends and community.

Jason has only 2 weeks left of therapy in Lincoln.

He plans to go back to college in Hastings this Summer.

Good timing provided chopper that rescued boy

An eight-year-old boy’s against-all-odds survival is being credited in part to some very fortunate timing.

Samuel Gross was submerged in nearly freezing water for 20 minutes about two weeks ago before he was pulled out by a relative. He was then airlifted to a Winnipeg hospital by a helicopter ambulance not normally available in Manitoba.

The boy had become caught in a culvert on the Westrock Hutterite Colony near Portage la Prairie, Man., 100 kilometres west of Winnipeg.

The high-tech chopper that took him to hospital was only in the province because the government had been leasing it from Alberta to help fight flooding. Ontario, British Columbia and Nova Scotia are the only other jurisdictions with at least one air ambulance.

The helicopter’s ability to move Samuel quickly has made an impression on the government, which had already been considering whether to acquire choppers for medical emergencies.

"This particular incident shows how the helicopter can fit within the actual emergency response system . . . it certainly illustrates that there was a benefit there," Bernadette Preun, assistant deputy minister for health emergency services, said Friday.

Doctors at the hospital kept his body chilled for two days to prevent brain inflammation before slowly warming Samuel back up. After a tense first night in hospital, with doctors fighting to clear stomach contents from his lungs, the boy's vital signs appeared strong. But nobody could determine if his brain had been deprived of oxygen long enough to cause brain damage. His family prayed and sang religious songs around his hospital bed.

On Wednesday, he woke up and was able to recite his name, birth date and father's cellphone number. His family called it a miracle.

Sam's arm still aches - he injured it while being sucked through the culvert - but his father says he's eager to leave the hospital. "Day by day, he will get better," said Mr. Gross. "A couple of weeks maybe and he will go home."

At the Westroc colony yesterday, residents had grown weary of the media attention Sam's story had brought. Barraged with media calls, many said they would no longer answer questions.

The survival of an 8-year-old Canadian boy who was submerged in icy water for 20 minutes and awoke from a 13-day coma "is remarkable," a doctor said.

Abruzzo Earthquake 'Miracle'

On the Monday of Holy Week the Abruzzo region of Central Italy was hit by its most devastating earthquake in 30 years, measuring a magnitude of 6.3 and claiming almost 300 lives. Amidst the wreckage, however, there emerged a sign of hope.

It happened in Rocca di Cambio, the highest mountain village in the Gran Sasso Mountains of Abruzzo. There, in the church of San Pietro alla Collegiata, a fresco of the Virgin Mother and infant Jesus was discovered.

The fresco appeared when the earthquake shook the church and the altar came away from wall. Experts believe the artwork is from the 11th Century at the time the church was built.

Antonio Pace, the mayor of Rocca di Cambio, told the London times, “When we went in to check the damage we saw that the altar had moved, and behind the fallen plaster was the fresco. There was tremendous excitement, as you can imagine.”

“This is wonderful news at a time of so much destruction and sorrow,” Pace went on to say. “The appearance of the Madonna and Child is a sign of hope. Nothing short of a miracle.”

A survivor's miracle in the rubble

TERAMO, Italy (CNN) -- The father of a 20-year-old student, one of the last to be pulled alive from the rubble says it could only have been a miracle that saved his daughter.

Luigi Calesini says when he arrived at his daughter Eleonora's university dorm most of the building had already collapsed on itself.

He says he thought it was a lost cause because his daughter lived on the ground floor.

"We waited and waited, and they were only pulling out dead bodies. Then we heard they pulled a woman out so we ran to see and it was Eleonora. We spoke to her and she recognized us but then they took her to the field hospital" said Calesini from the hospital where his daughter is now being treated.

"She was conscious, but then they took her away from me and now I'm afraid they won't give her back to me," he added.

Eleonora is said to be in a serious but stable condition and the hospital is being very guarded about her prognosis.

"The first thing she asked was what time it was and then she asked for some food" said Luciano Roncalli, a rescue team leader who helped pull Eleonora out from hundreds of tons of rubble and debris Wednesday.

"Our task is to save lives and that means everything to us" says Roncalli.

For days now though there has been precious little good news from rescue sites.

As many as a dozen people could still be missing and Italian authorities say they will continue to work at it until at least Sunday.

Even now, rescuers say they are finding what could be signs of life on some sites and continue to dig by hand to remove rubble.

In some ways this tragedy will be most remembered for the desperate vigil kept by parents after two university dorms collapsed.

Tensions were high on rescue sites for several days as parents lived the agony of seeing the collapsed buildings teeter and rescue teams hampered by strong aftershocks.

And many witnessing the destruction question why modern buildings should have collapsed at all.

"It doesn't help to fester about why this happened, I don't know if the building was built properly," says Calesini adding, "what I do know is that this is a miracle and I want it to stay that way."

Child caught after falling three stories

At 6:30 last night, Robert Lemire was chatting on his cell phone, talking about coaching his daughter's softball team this spring.
But when he looked across the street, Lemire quickly realized someone else's daughter was going to need his help first.
A child was dangling out of a third-story window at 700 Haverhill St., and Lemire, without thinking about his own safety, bolted across the busy street to help the toddler. Then, with help from Alex Day, another Good Samaritan, the two men caught 11/2-year-old Caliah Clark as she fell about 40 feet into their waiting arms.
"I've only seen something like that on TV," said Lemire, a Methuen father of two girls, ages 13 and 16.
Police last night credited the hustle of the two men with saving the girl as she hung from the apartment window.
"The quick response, the calls for help. These guys are heroes, no question about it," said police Chief John Romero.
The girl was taken to Lawrence General Hospital for evaluation, but police don't believe she suffered any serious injuries. As required by law, the Department of Social Services was immediately notified about the accident and is expected to investigate.
"She's lucky. Everybody is lucky," said Lemire, 45, a remodeling contractor.
Lemire said he had stopped on Haverhill Street and was going to order supper from a nearby pizza joint. As he was chatting outside on his cell phone, the first thing he noticed, as he looked across the street, were toys being thrown out of the apartment at 700 Haverhill St., a large Victorian-style home.
Then, he saw the third-floor window was wide open and a little girl was hanging outside. Two other kids were holding onto her by her arms as she dangled outside the window.
Lemire said he bolted across busy Haverhill Street, nearly getting hit by a car. He yelled for help.
Day, 23, who was attending a Bible study meeting inside 700 Haverhill St., heard someone yelling outside and fearing a fire had ignited, he jumped up to see what was going on.
He soon met Lemire, who pointed to the side of the house "where there was a child hanging out the window," Day told police.
Lemire "was just going frantic trying to get her," Day said last night.
Both men ran around the house and stood underneath Caliah, who suddenly fell into their arms. Day caught the top of her body, while Lemire grabbed the lower half.
"As soon as I told him what was happening, we both looked up and there she came," Lemire said.
When Lemire dialed 911 for help, he said his "fingers were numb."
Day then went upstairs and spoke to the child's father, Randall Clark, 27, and expressed "his disappointment as to what had just occurred," according to a police report. Clark told police he was caring for a newborn child in the apartment's bathroom when he heard a commotion outside. When he went to see what the kids were doing, he found his two oldest children near the "wide open window," the police report said.
"He then reported not seeing the 11/2 year old anywhere in the room and felt like something had gone wrong. He ran down to the second floor where he was met by Alex Day with his child in his hand," the report said.
The window is close to the floor and can be easily opened. There was no screen in the window, Patrolman Rhadames Gonzalez noted in his report.
The city's Inspectional Services division was also notified about the window. Lemire said he was just happy the evening had a happy ending.
"Thank God," he said.
Day agreed, describing the event as "absolutely incredible."
"She was so small, she would have really been hurt," he said. "It was pretty amazing when I look back on the whole thing."

The shot that saved lives

One year ago Mykal Riley sank a three that kept fans out of the path of a tornado. But Riley would never have been there if not for an intricate web of chance meetings, false starts and a terrible crime.

THE CLOCK STARTS WHEN THE SHOOTER CATCHES the ball, on the left wing, 24 feet from the basket. Two seconds left. He has run off a screen from the baseline, so his momentum carries him toward midcourt. He pushes hard off his right foot and pivots back to the left. One-point-four seconds. When he rises off the floor, the force of this hard cut is still carrying him left. One second. He believes Jesus will guide this shot.

The shooter flicks his right wrist at the peak of his jump, and if you photographed him now, you could put it in a textbook. Eight tenths of a second. The ball is still airborne when time expires and the horn sounds. The shot is almost perfect. But the shooter was drifting left, as you recall, and the ball lands just left of the target. It hits the back of the rim, the boxy part with the springs, and the springs rattle. The ball caroms from back rim to front, seeming to gain speed as it goes, and it suddenly leaps out of the cylinder.

The secret things belong unto the Lord our God. The shooter believes this because his King James Bible says so, and because of what he has seen, and soon he will believe it more deeply than ever. The ball sails toward the backboard, hits the center of the white square, and falls through the net.

This shot does nothing to change the game's outcome. And yet, for pure utility, it may be as great as any play in the history of sports. Eight minutes later, on the evening of March 14, 2008, during this Southeastern Conference tournament game between Alabama and Mississippi State, a tornado will roar through downtown Atlanta, and high winds will breach the Georgia Dome, and metal will strike the hardwood, and players will flee for cover, and it will seem to be snowing indoors. By morning Mykal Riley's three-pointer will be known as The Shot That Saved Lives.

Outside, the tornado passes just north of the Dome and screams through Centennial Olympic Park with winds of 120 mph. Glass rains down from hundreds of broken windows. Siding is ripped from the Dome's exterior. Potted plants go flying. Metal is driven into the side of a covered walkway. Cars flip over. Two 65-foot light towers topple in the park.

To the east, near a neighborhood called Cabbagetown, a homeless man is killed by a collapsing brick wall. But no serious injuries are reported downtown because the thunderstorm that came before the tornado has driven almost everyone off the streets, and 14,825 are safe inside the Dome, watching the overtime forced by Mykal Riley.

There is no way to prove that his shot saved lives. We can know only what did happen, and what didn't. Nevertheless, all the people interviewed for this story about their experience in the Dome that night believe that Mykal's shot prevented injuries and even deaths.

http://vault.sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1153064/index.htm

Miracle on the Hudson

No one ever landed a plane that large on a body of water let alone on a fast river.

"The left engine just blew. Fire, flames were coming out of it and I was looking at it because I was sitting right there. And it just started smelling like gasoline," a passenger told WNBC. "...Everyone started, to be honest, to say prayers."

All of the passengers survived, according to initial reports thanks to the expertise, bravery and cool of the pilot, Chesley B. "Sully" Sullenberger III, a hero whose calm saved 155 people, including a little baby, from an icy and fiery death in what could only be called a miracle.

"It looks like a miraculous rescue underway," Bill White of the nearby Intrepid Museum told reporters. "It was an extraordinary rescue effort."

Ferry passengers who happened to be on the Hudson at the time of the crash jumped into action.

“We just started taking people from the wing and the inflatable rafts,” said Janis Krums who was riding on one of the first boats to arrive and rescue the passengers. “And we just started giving them clothes and keeping them warm… in less than six or seven minutes we just had five or six boats helping.”

Stunned passengers struggled to describe the harrowing experience.


“I don't even know how to put it into words right now," Alberto Panero told CNN. "I actually grabbed one of the seats; that was the first thing that came to my mind. Some people grabbed the inflatable one. Immediately there were folks coming to us and throwing life jackets to us and helping us get to safety."

"There were a couple of people who took charge and started yelling for everyone to calm down," Panero said. "Once everyone realized we were going to be OK, they settled down."

Along the bank of the Hudson, eyewitnesses could not believe their eyes: a plane was flying impossibly low yet steady as can be. It was as if the pilot was approaching a runway, not the icy winter waters of Manhattan’s Hudson River.

“I saw a plane coming down the Hudson in very controlled fashion but much much lower than it should be,” Christian Martin told MSNBC. “It was really just a remarkable job … It could not appear more controlled or smooth as the pilot touched down in the water.”

Are there Miracles?

I was talking with my friend Mark about an explosion at CTA Acoustics. Two workers saw the fireball coming at them. Then about 10 feet away it stopped. Mark said the explosion which killed 6 people ran out of fuel. The two workers thought it was the Hand of God.

Mark and I investigated a quadruple fatality at Buffalo rock in the late 1980's It occurred when an ammo loading machine misfired and caused a small bang. The bang shook the dust off the rafters and then it the larger second explosion killed four of the eight workers. I interview two workers who didn't make it in. One was caring for a sick kid and had no backup and the other couldn't get his car started. Both had great attendance. Why did they not make it in?

In 1995, a worker took off his safety harness in Algoquin IL on the water tower. He fell 110 feet into small pile of sand. No injuries. 100 people could do that and be dead or crippled.

This blog is just my attempt to record some of these events.