"The cool thing is, the more you think about the miracle itself, Father Valera lives in the 19th century. He never came to the U.S. We have no knowledge of him coming here. Never came to Rhode Island."

"And yet, because the doctor called out and called upon his name for help in the situation back in ‘07 on behalf of that little baby, he decided to intervene and ask God for a miracle."

Said Reverend Timothy Reilly of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Providence, quoted in "Pope Leo XIV declares a miracle at Rhode Island hospital, crediting prayer with saving baby’s life in 2007" (NY Post).

The baby, Tyquan Hall, was delivered in Rhode Island and expected to die, but the doctor, Juan Sanchez, who was from Huercal-Overa, Spain, prayed for intercession from his region’s patron, Father Valera Parra, who lived in Huercal-Overa from 1816 to 1889.

"A man who entered an M.R.I. room during a scan in Westbury, N.Y., on Wednesday was pulled into the machine by his chain necklace..."

"... and was hospitalized in critical condition, the authorities said. The man, who is 61, was wearing a 'large metallic chain' around his neck... did not have authorization to enter the room, the authorities said...."

The NYT reports.

UPDATE: The man died the next day.

"I just started punching it in the head as hard as I could. And he had let go and and then grabbed me again. And the second time that he let go and grabbed me..."

"... he had drug me underneath the water. And he like shook my leg around.... Whenever he let go, I had started running up. And I had gotten up out of the water."

From "Florida teen saves herself from alligator that dragged her underwater: ‘I just started punching'" (NY Post).

Young and old... good luck and bad...

Screen grab from the sidebar at The Guardian. The stories are here — "Gus pulled the arrow out of his head by himself and immediately went to see his mother, who was vacuuming inside... He kept saying, 'Mom, am I dying? Am I going to leave you? I don’t want to leave you yet'" — and here — "It is with great sadness that we can confirm our icon of humanity and powerhouse of positivity Fauja Singh has passed away in India."

"'Okay, we’re going to go out,' she told the girls around 3 a.m., but the first in line, a 9-year-old, was afraid to jump."

"So out Ainslie [Bashara, a counselor at Camp Mystic] leaped, and when her bare feet touched the ground, the water, rushing past with such force it felt like rapids, crested at her waist. If the girl had gone first, Ainslie realized, she would have been swept away. Stunned by the cold, Ainslie caught her balance as her co-counselors inside kept the girls calm and coaxed them through the window. The pair eased the first girl out to Ainslie, then a second, then a third. All of them were crying. They clung to Ainslie — her arms, back, waist, hair — as the former dancer slogged through the current toward a dry pavilion about 30 yards away.... She dropped off the first set of campers, told them to wait, and returned to Giggle Box, repeating the trip until the cabin was empty...."

From "In the dark, amid screams, a Camp Mystic counselor had 16 girls and one headlamp/As the Texas floodwaters rushed into their cabins, the teen counselors braved the unknown" (WaPo)(free access link).

Can tourists run?

The scene on Mount Etna yesterday:

Tourists and guides run for their lives when Mount Etna suddenly erupts pic.twitter.com/HKhTiUCuUe

— Nature is Amazing ☘️ (@AMAZlNGNATURE) June 3, 2025

What am I looking at? Are these people running for their life? Are they running fast enough?

Here's "An Eruption at Mount Etna Sends Hikers Scrambling for Cover/Videos circulating on social media showed visitors rushing to descend the mountain as volcanic plumes rose overhead" (NYT).

In recent years, authorities have struggled to control imprudent visitors who failed to appreciate the risks of getting a close look at the island’s most prominent landmark. Mount Etna, a stratovolcano, or a conical volcano with relatively steep sides, shows almost continuous activity from its main craters and relatively frequent lava flows from craters and fissures along its sides..... Hannah and Charlie Camper, a couple from England, were... aware of previous eruptions but thought they would be “completely fine,” since “it’s active all the time”.... 

Apparently, all the tourists were completely fine yesterday. 

"Mr. Peng was apparently the victim of a potentially dangerous phenomenon that paragliders call 'cloud suck,' in which a pilot is rapidly drawn upward into a cloud."

"At extreme altitudes, people risk hypoxia, or oxygen deprivation, because of the thin air. Severe hypoxia can cause organ damage or death. Still, Mr. Peng managed to land about 20 miles away from where he took off. In stable health and recovering from his surprise flight, he has since said, 'Thinking about it still makes me quite scared,' China Daily reported on Thursday."

From "Chinese Paraglider Reaches Near-Record Heights, Over 28,000 Feet, by Accident/After video of the incident went viral, showing a face and body covered in ice, the local sporting authority said it had banned the paraglider from the sport for six months" (NYT).

Man versus beast stories of the day.

1. "Man 'jumped' by coyote saves himself by strangling it for 10 minutes: 'Either him or me'" ("He jumped on me and I caught him in the air, he was biting me, and so when I threw him down and I’m trying to slide out of the way, he just kept coming.... I had to rip my left hand out of his mouth, and when I got my left hand out, I just choked him all the way till the police got there....")

2. "Man dies in bee attack despite frantic escape attempt that had him drive through neighbor’s yard" ("Stephen Daniel... frantically jumped into his vehicle to get away, but the bees followed him inside and continued to sting him until he crashed into Chrishae Cooper’s property...").

Every man for himself.

In the comments to the previous post, about the Cuauhtémoc disaster, Old and slow said: "They could see the collision coming. I don't understand why the sailors stayed up on the yardarms."

I asked Grok, "Were they courageously holding their formation? Were they waiting for a command?" and guessed that no such command was given because the men could not have scampered down all at once. Grok observed: "Staying in place, secured by harnesses, may have been safer than attempting to climb down without clear instructions.... Naval operations prioritize collective action over individual initiative in emergencies.... The sailors likely held their positions to avoid creating additional hazards, trusting their officers to issue appropriate commands."

My inclination was to credit the sailors with courage, but Grok thought it was more likely a matter of "duty and discipline." If adhering to duty and discipline doesn't count as courage, are we systematically lying to ourselves and others and engaging in sentimentalism and propaganda when we speak of courage in the military? And why would it be less courageous to unclip the harness and attempt to descend?

In writing my question for Grok, I thought of the expression "Every man for himself." Is that a command ever given in the navy? Grok said — full Grok answers here — that's not a formal command in the naval tradition. But then why do I know that phrase? Where does it come from?

The one that got away.

A fish tale:

"Rockalina the eastern box turtle was captured in 1977 and forced to live on a kitchen floor for nearly 50 years. She was fed cat food and lettuce...."

You may have followed the story of Rockalina on TikTok, but this YouTube version, which just went up yesterday, collects the whole story.

An update on Valerie.

You remember Valerie, the miniature dachshund who escaped into the wilds of Kangaroo Island, blogged here.

Today, I see "Valerie the dachshund rescued after 17 months in Australian wilderness/The eight-pound miniature dachshund had transformed from an 'absolute princess' into a rugged survivor" (WaPo).

I had to blog that... in case you were on tenterhooks.

What are tenterhooks anyway?

"I got my one foot stuck because I was trying to get my electronics out of my pocket. I knew not to panic."

"I have to be a macho man. You can’t ask for help when you’re trying to impress the girl you’re with."

Said Mitchell O’Brien, quoted in "Man Sinks in Quicksand and Emerges With a Girlfriend/A Michigan man who ended up waist-deep on an unstable beach was rescued, and found himself in a relationship" (NYT).

A comforting thought: "As it happens, drowning in quicksand in real life is nearly impossible, scientists say. Sand is denser than the human body, so even if one’s legs sink, the air in the lungs keeps the body too buoyant to go all the way under."

And here's that John Mulaney bit about quicksand: "I always thought that quicksand was going to be a much bigger problem than it turned out to be. Because if you watch cartoons, quicksand is like the third biggest thing you have to worry about in adult life — behind real sticks of dynamite and giant anvils falling on you from the sky. I used to sit around and think about what to do about quicksand. I never thought about how to handle real problems in adult life, I was never like 'Oh, what's it gonna be like when relatives ask to borrow money?' Now that I've gotten older, not only have I never stepped in quicksand—I've never even heard about it! No one's ever been like, 'Hey if you're coming to visit, take I-90 'cause I-95 has a little quicksand in the middle. Looks like regular sand, but then you're gonna start to sink into it.'"

"We’re pretty surprised, that’s for sure. She wasn’t even just like a dog; she was an absolute princess as well. She had a car seat, and she slept in our bed."

Said Georgia Gardner, 24, about her 1-year-old, 8-pound dachshund Valerie.

Gardner is quoted in "Tiny dachshund survives 16 months on remote island but eludes rescuers/Her owners call her a 'princess.' But little Valerie has likely toughened up, says the wildlife group looking for her, living off roadkill and evading poisonous snakes" (WaPo)(free-access link, so you can see the pictures and read the thrilling details).

A song for Valerie:

And:

"As the days passed, Ms. Cassell grew increasingly thirsty, later telling a friend that her tongue felt like 'a lizard'..."

"... and that her lips were constantly chapped. She knew she could survive for a while without food, but only a few days without water. There was a shallow creek near her car, but even if she opened the door and stretched out her hand, she was about three feet short of the water. So she again got creative: She took her favorite sweater and unfurled it into the water, letting the pink fabric soak up the water before pulling it back and wringing it into her mouth. Her mother later dubbed it her 'fishing pole' for liquid. Days into the ordeal, Ms. Cassell accepted that she might lose her legs, her husband said. But she refused to lose her grip on reality. 'She said she’d empty out her purse and put everything back, then empty out her purse and put everything back in, just to keep her mind going,' Mr. Cassell said. All the while, she wore her voice hoarse as she screamed at passing cars...."

From "'I Thought I Was Going to Die Here': 6 Days Trapped in a Car, Just Out of Sight/Brieonna Cassell crashed into a ditch, shattering bones and getting pinned inside. Just yards away from a road, she was determined to survive until help arrived" (NYT)(free-access link).

"It was just incredibly fast. There was a giant firewall down the side. I could actually feel the heat through the glass."

"Then we were going sideways. I'm not even sure how many times we tumbled, but we ended upside down."

Said passenger John Nelson, quoted in "'Hanging...like bats': Toronto plane crash survivor speaks out after aircraft flips on runway" (ABC News). 

When the plane finally came to a stop, Nelson recounted[,]... the cabin was suddenly quiet before the 80 people onboard -- most of whom were hanging upside down [like] bats in the cabin – attempted to “make a sense of what just had happened. We released the seat belts. I kind of fell to the floor, which is now the ceiling...."

I would have said "I fell to the ceiling, which was now the floor," but I get it and he was there. Do we have video of the scene with 80 people silent, but hanging like bats? 

Here's another view from the outside:

This is INSANE

pic.twitter.com/qegJ1P3wCa

— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) February 18, 2025

"He Was Pushed in Front of a Subway Train. How Did He Survive?"

I'm using my last free-access link of the month on this very well-written NYT article by Katherine Rosman.

Suddenly he found himself in midair above the tracks. He saw the lights of an oncoming train, so close that he could make out the shape of the train’s operator. He did not expect to survive.

“My life did not flash before my eyes,” he said. “My thought was ‘I’ve been pushed, and I’m going to get hit by the train.’”

"Welp. I'm cooked.... I was just bit on the leg by a diamondback.... Let's get some pictures of it first."

NEW: Florida man accepts his fate after being bitten by a diamondback rattlesnake, says he is "cooked" but at least it will make a good meme.

Gotta respect his commitment to the meme game.

Social media influencer David Humphlett told the snake "good game" (gg) before he was… pic.twitter.com/Vmwh4ve3RT

— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) December 31, 2024

We're told that this young man, a "social media influencer" named David Humphlett, made it to the hospital, but not before swinging his camera around and complimenting the snake: "Let's get some pictures of it first. We're already screwed anyways. Cool snake! Big diamondback!"

They're saving him at the hospital. He received 88 vials of antivenin. You may think he's an idiot, but is he? Hearing his words called to mind Seneca's "How to Die" (commission earned) which I happen to be in the middle of reading:

There’s no life that’s not short. If you examine the nature of things, even the life of Nestor is short, or that of Sattia, who ordered inscribed on her tombstone that she had lived ninety-nine years. You see in her someone glorying in a long old age. But who could have endured her, if she had filled out a full century? Just as with storytelling, so with life: it’s important how well it is done, not how long. It doesn’t matter at what point you call a halt. Stop wherever you like; only put a good closer on it. Farewell.

 We're already screwed anyways. We're cooked. This is it. This is death. It came by snake. And you have the presence of mind to proclaim: Cool snake.

"More than 400 passengers were on board a high-speed train near Paris on Christmas Eve when the driver opened his door and apparently jumped off..."

"... leaving the passengers to speed away at 186mph. But within half a minute, the train’s controls averted disaster: they detected the driver’s absence and brought it to a halt 1.5 miles down the track by Melun, 25 miles south of the capital.... As trains up and down the line were slowed and halted, no contact could be made with the driver, who had been alone, locked in his cabin.... 'We really couldn’t understand what had happened'.... After 15 minutes a ticket inspector walked up the track, forced open the driver’s door from the outside and found the cabin empty. For more than two hours, emergency service personnel searched the dark line with torches. The driver’s body was spotted eventually by a fire service infra-red drone.... Suicides are common in the Christmas period but it was the first time in the SNCF’s history that a driver had jumped to his death from a speeding train...."

From "Hundreds of passengers saved after driver jumps from 186mph trainAutomatic stop technology halted the TGV from Paris to Saint-Étienne after the driver apparently took his own life" (London Times).

The transport minister gave credit to the driver for committing suicide by jumping out of the train rather than by derailing it.

Canada man.

"Canada man jumps on polar bear to defend wife from attack" (BBC): "A man in Canada's far north leapt on to a polar bear to protect his wife from being mauled, police say. The unnamed man suffered serious injuries but is expected to recover...."

I like "Canada man" as a contrast to the familiar "Florida man." Canada man is strong and effective and a loyal husband.

Also, this story contrasts to the familiar bear-related advice: "If it's brown lay down, if it's black fight back, if it's white good night."

Alysa McCall, a scientist at Polar Bear International, told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) that polar bears rarely attack humans. When an attack occurs, the bear is often hungry, young and unwell, she said.... "If you're attacked by a polar bear, definitely do not play dead — that is a myth," she told CBC. "Fight as long as you can."