Unit6TheManintheWater

▪
Comments on the Event
▪ The following are a few words his mother Virginia Williams used to describe her son.
"He was average," she said. "Just average."
▪ and awards from the Overseas Press ▪ Club and the American Bar Association, ▪ among others. His television essays for
Roger Rosenblatt Professor of English Professor of Writing
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Moments After the Crash
▪ At 3:59 the plane shuddered as it took off and tried to gain altitude. It cleared two of the bridges on the Potomic River, but was losing altitude. The crew and passengers knew they were in trouble before it struck the 14th Street Bridge and it tore in half as it slammed through cars and railing (栏杆） then plunged into the cold, icy, dark waters.
These five people however survived and they were able to survive because of four heroes. The author wrote this essay in praise of these heroes, three of whom had risked their lives to rescue the survivors and were able to live to tell the story, but the man that really held the whole nation’s attention was the fourth one who had kept pushing his lifeline and flotation rings to others until he went under.
“For isn't it, in times of danger, the average man who saves us all?”
▪ Moments later only the tail section remained afloat, 79 people were aboard Flight 90, six were to survive the crash, but only five would live.
▪ Huddled together in the cold icy waters， the survivors waited for the rescue helicopter to arrive. Trea some with broken arms and legs, two with collapsed lungs caused from the impact. "We're all going to die," someone said.
▪ Others’comment: “It‘s people like these that are heroes. Those people who step out of he norm（规范, 准则） and put their life second in consideration of others in a crisis.”
▪ With room for only one helicopter at a time between bridges, it returned with two lifelines, and again Williams caught it and handed it off to yet another survivor, Joe Stiley, the most seriously injured passenger.
▪ the “MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour” have
AB, New York University
▪ won him a George Foster Peabody Award
Ph.D, Harvard University
▪ and an Emmy. He is also the author of six books.
▪
II. About the Air Crash
▪ One of the worst snowstorms in the history of Washington, D.C. hit the city 20 years ago on Jan. 13, 1982. Just about everything closed down — the government, businesses, schools, the airports.
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▪ Upon seeing this and as Tirado was about to go under, an onlooker, Lenny Skutnik, plunged from the banks of the river into the freezing water and brought her safely to shore.
I. About the Author
▪ Roger Rosenblatt is a journalist,
▪ author, playwright and professor.
▪ As an essayist for Time magazine,
▪ he has won two George Polk Awards,
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▪ Minutes later, the plane smashed into the 14th Street Bridge, only 1,200 yards from the Pentagon, destroying four automobiles and killing five people. The jet then fell into the ice-covered Potomac River , bringing all the passengers to their instant death except five —four passengers and one flight attendant — from the tail section, who found themselves gasping and struggling in the icy water.
▪ By 4:30 p.m, Williams had been in the freezing water for 29 minutes, and his turn had finally come. The helicopter turned once more toward the sinking tail, its two-man crew eager to meet the man in the water, "to tell him they had never seen such selfless courage.
▪ By about noon, the skies cleared and Washington’s National Airport reopened for business. The crew of Air Florida Flight 90 began preparing for a nonstop trip to sunny Fort Lauderdale, Florida. At 3:59 p.m., the twinengine Boeing 737 was cleared for takeoff and began rumbling down the runway on its final flight.
▪ Aboard Flight 90 was Arland K. Williams Jr., who always sat in the tail section of the plane, “the safest part of the plane, he said.” Not long before, Williams had just discussed his marriage with the woman he loved, “I think we’re going to marry soon. ”
▪ Tirado , who also clung to Stiley and her life line, however, exhausted, in pain and shock, soon lost her grip and plunged back into the cold icy waters of the Potomac. Rescuers again tossed her a life line but she was unable to grasp it to save her own life.
▪ They strained (竭尽全力）for signs of the hero of Flight 90. But the balding man was gone. "He could have gone on the first trip," pilot Usher wept, “but he put everyone else ahead of himself. Everyone.”