A Bangkok smoke-eater turns web-slinger to save an autistic child

[thatcrazycajun]

With most profuse thanks to supergee for pointing me to this BBC News story: An autistic eight-year-old boy who climbed out on a third-floor window ledge at his school in Bangkok, Thailand yesterday was saved after teachers failed to persuade him to climb back in to safety...by a quick-thinking city firefighter who just happened to be in possession of the one thing needed to effect rescue: a Spider-Man® costume.

Yes, you read right—Spider-Man, as in the wall-crawling wonder who has been Marvel Comics' biggest non-mutant cash cow for four decades and counting. The firefighter normally only hauls out the Spidey suit for visits to schools holding fire drills; but this day, it provided him the heroic image the tyke most admired to calm his rather extreme case of first-day-at-school jitters and coax him off the ledge.

For someone with no less than three union firefighters in the immediate family (dad, younger bro and godson in training), this story was a real day-maker. It also resonates with me for another reason: My late mother and her second husband spent two years living in Bangkok in the mid-1970s, while Step-Dad was posted to his oil-company employer's office there. (Sadly, us kids never got to visit.) And of course, being not only a comic-book fan practically from infancy, but a fan of New York's favorite resident superhero almost as long (yes, even through the misbegotten Clone Saga and the recent "Brand New Day" reboot), I found still a third thing to love about this story. (Who knew cosplay could be a professional life-saving tool?)

So congratulations, Somchai Yoosabai. You just made my list of Real Life Heroes™...and gave me one hell of a terrific story to tell my relatives next time I visit home.

Comments

[hitchhiker.livejournal.com]

have you seen helpers? it's all about sharing stories like this :)

[boogiebabe-smap.livejournal.com]

Way cool! Have to share this with my brother and nephew who are volunteer firefighters.