11 Saved Heroes in Everyday Life

CHAPTER 1 A Hero's Story: Tilly Smith IN 2004, A TEN-YEAR-OLD ENGLISH GIRL CALLED TILLY SMITH LEARNED ABOUT TSUNAMIS IN HER CLASS AT SCHOOL. Tilly's teacher, Andrew Kearney, told the children all about tsunamis. Tilly thought it was very interesting. Only a week or two after that, Tilly went to Thailand with her mother, father, and sister. They stayed in Phuket, a favorite place for people on vacation. One day, Tilly and her family went to Maikhao Beach. Many people were there to enjoy the sun, go swimming, play games, and have a good time. Then Tilly saw something very unusual. The water began to leave the beach quickly! She remembered Mr. Kearney's lesson: it is dangerous when water leaves the beach fast. It shows that a tsunami is coming. Tilly was worried. She told her mother and father about the water. They spoke to the other families on the beach and the people who worked in the hotels, too. They all left the beach. They quickly walked up to high ground, away from the water, and waited. And then the tsunami came. It was a wall of water. It was many meters tall! People in other places had big problems, and many people died. But the people at Maikhao Beach were all safe. A ten-year-old girl saved them. Tilly was a hero!

CHAPTER 2 Superheroes SUPER CAN MEAN "GREAT" OR "BETTER THAN NORMAL." SO SUPERHEROES CAN DO MORE THAN NORMAL PEOPLE -AND MORE THAN OTHER HEROES! We all know Spider-Man and Superman with their famous costumes. Superman can do much more than us. He can fly, stop trains with his hands, jump over tall buildings, and see through walls. These are his super powers. In superhero stories, there are also villains. Villains do a lot of very bad things. The superhero's job is to stop the villain. Some villains are supervillains because they have super powers, too. In the Superman stories, Brainiac is a supervillain. He can fly like Superman, and he can move things by thinking about them. Many people like to read about superheroes or watch movies about them. It is fun for people to think about super powers. They think, "What super power would I like to have?" Of course, there aren't any superheroes in the world, and normal people do not have super powers. But who knows? Maybe one day...

CHAPTER 3 Folk Heroes PEOPLE LOVE STORIES ABOUT HEROES. SOME OF THESE STORIES ARE VERY, VERY OLD. The Romans lived in Italy more than 2,000 years ago. They wrote about Spartacus. He was big and strong. He fought hard to help people. Today, Spartacus is a folk hero. A folk hero is a hero that many people in a town or country know about. Usually, the story starts as a true story— a real person does something dangerous or heroic. People hear, remember, and tell the story year after year. The story changes and gets bigger and bigger. There are more and more stories. Soon, the real person is a folk hero, and the stories are folk stories. Many folk heroes take money from rich people and give it to poor people: Robin Hood in England, Ishikawa Goemon in Japan, Ustym Karmaliuk in Ukraine, and many others. Many people say that folk heroes do not die; they are sleeping, and they wake up when their people need them. These folk heroes are often kings or famous people: Arthur in England, Charlemagne in Germany, El Cid in Spain, and others. There are also many national heroes in different parts of the world. Simon Bolivar is a national hero in some countries in South America. He fought the Spanish to help some South American people be free. People like to tell stories about him. In the future, he may be a folk hero!

CHAPTER 4 Professional Heroes SOME PEOPLE ARE PROFESSIONAL HEROES: IT IS PART OF THEIR JOB TO RESCUE PEOPLE. The police stop people from doing bad things. Paramedics go to dangerous places to help people. Soldiers fight for their country in a war. Many people say that these people are heroes. Think about firefighters. Is a firefighter a hero when he or she helps somebody leave a burning house? It is dangerous work, but we pay firefighters to do this job— to fight fire. Are they really heroes? Are doctors heroes when they save somebody's life? This is also difficult and important work, but we pay doctors to do it. And it is usually not dangerous for the doctors. Paramedics have a much more dangerous job. They help people when there is an accident on the road. Sometimes they have to go into burning cars to rescue people. They also have to help crazy or dangerous people. Are paramedics more heroic than doctors?

Soldiers sometimes have to fight for their country. We usually call soldiers heroes if they save other soldiers when it's dangerous. But soldiers don't always fight. Sometimes soldiers save people when there is a natural disaster, like a flood. In a flood, the water from rivers gets very high and goes into people's houses. Are soldiers heroes when they rescue people from natural disasters? If a soldier is ready to fight or to save people, but there isn't a war and there isn't a natural disaster, is he or she still a hero? Sometimes professionals do heroic things when they are not working. They can stop something bad or rescue somebody. In Australia in 2011, police officer Raelene Longden was on a train after she left work. There was an accident. A man fell under the train. It was very dangerous, but Officer Longden jumped down and went under the train to help him. She saved his life. Are police officers heroes only when they are not working? What about when they are working?

CHAPTER 5 Hero For a Day SOMETIMES, PEOPLE DON'T WANT TO BE HEROES. THEY DON'T ASK TO BE HEROES. BUT DANGEROUS THINGS HAPPEN, AND THEY ARE HEROES. In January 2009, a plane left New York City in the USA. There were a lot of big birds flying in the sky that day. After only three minutes in the air, the plane flew into some of the birds, and the plane stopped working. The pilot, Captain Sullenberger, was really worried. "This is dangerous," he thought. "This plane cannot stay in the sky!" He had to land the plane quickly and safely. He looked down, but there was nowhere to go— only the Hudson River. He had to bring the plane down on the water but not in the water. People near the river watched the plane and waited. This was crazy! But he did it! The pilot landed the plane on the river! All the passengers came out of the plane and stood on the plane's wings. People came to the plane in boats and rescued the passengers. They were all safe. Everyone said that Captain Sullenberger was a hero. Do you think Captain Sullenberger is a hero, or is he just a very good pilot? He helped many people that day, but he saved himself, too!