Editorial: Emergence of a true hero

Thursday, April 19, 2007 | 6:56 a.m.

Heroes cannot be spotted in a crowd. They usually look like the rest of us. But when something terrible occurs there are times when someone unexpectedly emerges to protect others from harm. This instinctive reaction, often taking a split second, is a rare trait.

Construction worker Wesley Autrey displayed that trait in January when he put his life on the line as he jumped into the path of an oncoming New York City subway train to save a young man who had fallen off the subway platform after suffering a seizure. On Monday at Virginia Tech several other heroes emerged. One who stood out was engineering and math lecturer Liviu Librescu, who sacrificed his life to save the lives of students who escaped the campus massacre.

Librescu, 76, had already experienced one of the worst horrors of the 20th century. He was a Nazi Holocaust survivor who was forced to work in a labor camp and then ordered to live in a ghetto with other Romanian Jews. We will never know whether that ordeal contributed to his selfless act of using his body to block a classroom door and absorb gunshots while his students jumped out windows to flee.

What we do know is that a number of students owe their lives to Librescu, something that undoubtedly didn't cross any of their minds when they first strolled into his classroom Monday morning. Librescu's selflessness in the face of such terror and depravity will stand as a testament to incredible bravery.