Buffalo, NY experienced a catastrophic blizzard over the Christmas weekend that left many stranded with over 4 ft of snow and winds of up to 70 mph. While the area is no stranger to snow, getting that much snow and high winds together is unusual. A group of South Korean tourists narrowly avoided a ruined vacation because of the kindness of strangers.
On the morning of Dec. 23, the winds went within minutes from 10 miles per hour up to 70. The storm lasted four days, but the vast majority of the snow — about 36 inches out of the total 51.9 inches recorded in the region — fell Friday into Saturday morning. Traveling from Niagara Falls to Washington DC, the tour group of 10 South Koreans got stuck in the blizzard on Christmas Eve.
Two of the group went to a local house to ask for a shovel to dislodge their vehicle. Alex Campagna heard their frantic knocking on his door. Knowing it was the worst blizzard he had ever seen, he thought it would be a better idea for them to wait out the storm. He invited them all inside, putting them up on couches, air mattresses, and sleeping bags.
Eager to repay his kindness, the guests cooked several South Korean meals like jeyuk bokkeum, stir-fried pork, and dakdori tang, a spicy chicken stew. As it turns out, Campagna and his wife really like Korean food and actually happened to have some of the more extravagant ingredients on hand.
The stranded travelers stayed the night Friday and Saturday, swapping stories and watching football. On Christmas day drivers came to pick up the tour group and took them to New York for some impromptu flights. A member of the group, Choi Yoseob said “It was kind of like fate, the luck of arriving at the Campagnas’ doorstep with their fully stocked kitchen and unhesitating hospitality. He said the hosts were “the kindest people I have ever met. We have enjoyed this so much.”
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Makayla Burns, 24, and her dad run a small business called Horrornaments, which makes creepy-themed ornaments such as evil pickles and violent clowns. The Michigan business was struggling so as a last ditch effort, she posted a TiktTok video asking for help-and help came. The video went viral with over 1.1 million likes, and sales lit up like a Christmas Tree.
The video shows her dad pacing aimlessly around their warehouse, clearly stressed out.”It’s the middle of December, and my dad is currently walking around the warehouse wondering why we aren’t busy with orders,” Burns wrote in the video. “I’ve been trying so hard to promote his ornaments, but I don’t know what to do anymore. And honestly it makes me so sad. Like…this is his livelihood.”
Burns said they received more orders in the last two days than they have in the previous 11 months. To date, the Burns team has 5,000 orders of ornaments and both are very thankful for the support. In another video, MaKayla’s dad gets choked up talking about it. “You just saved this business,” he tells her with tears in his eyes. “You have no idea how tickled I am.”
She said her dad was worried he might not even be able to pay his rent before the windfall. “Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I don’t know what else to say other than thank you.” Hopefully now that the company is on the radar of horror lovers, they will thrive in the new year.
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After Renee Story’s daughter’s flight was canceled, the determined mother’s positive thinking got her daughter home. Alanah Story was set for a 7PM flight from Orlando to Knoxville when her flight was delayed and ultimately canceled. Frontier Airlines was unable to give stranded passengers assurances that they would be able to fly out that night.
While at the help desk, Renee met Carlos, a police officer who was also heading to Knoxville for a 10:00 AM appointment with his daughter the next morning at a university. The two agreed that they could rent a van to drive there. They then suggested the idea to several passengers and they were able to gather a group of 13.
Alanah said “I was off to one side because I didn’t want to be involved, my mom just turned to me and said ‘we’re headed downstairs to get a van, come on people! Like 13 people followed her, I was just wondering what was happening.” Among the rest of the group were Johan and Adolf, from Mexico, Michelle, who was headed to a farming convention in Knoxville as a keynote speaker, and Q, who was simply trying to get home.
The strangers each chipped in $60 to rent a 15 passenger van and headed out on a road trip.
In the end, all the passengers managed to keep their appointments, Carlos’ daughter made it to the university appointment and Michelle was able to deliver her speech as the keynote speaker. Carlos posted a video to tiktok explaining “We made our 10:00 AM appointment, all because of a community that came together.”
But what started as a 650 mile journey of convenience, paced over 10 hours, ended with some brand new friendships. Alanah made friends with Q, who lives in Knoxville, and the two are planning on going out for karaoke soon. Carlos’ wife Lauren and Alanah’s mother Renee have also kept in touch.
Alanah said “It was not a quiet ride, no one was getting any sleep on that drive, I think I slept around 20 minutes. I really couldn’t have picked a better group of people to make the trip with. The whole experience really confirmed my faith in humanity for a little bit, in the States right now we’re going through a period of division, so it was nice to see.”
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Aero Angel is a charity organization that provides free flights for chronically ill children. The national aviation charity provides free flights using private jets flown by a crew of volunteer, professional pilots. Commercial airline travel is sometimes not a safe option because of a child’s illness and if specialists aren’t available in an ill child’s area, that can mean repeated trips farther away to seek expert care.
Aero Angel fills that gap, allowing children to get treatment they may not have had the option for without the transportation. They offer unlimited free flights to children in need of private transportation to appointments at specialist medical centers. The service is nationwide, and last year alone made about 70 flights. Aero Angel is not an air ambulance service and limits its flights to children whose fragile medical conditions mean commercial flying is not an option.
Brittany Baillargeon, Aero Angel’s Special Projects Director said families that need long distance transportation can just go to the website aeroangel.org, and fill out a flight request form and upload a letter of medical necessity. It’s free to all families whose children can’t fly commercial and all of the costs are covered through donors. The flights are provided to families until the service is no longer needed. While there is no set minimum mileage requirement, most of the flights are at least 500 miles long from the child’s home to their destination. The business jets flown have a non-stop range of 4 hours or about 2,000 miles.
Based in Denver, Colorado, AeroAngel was founded by Denver attorney and commercial pilot Mark Pestal. His passion for aviation and a desire to help others led him to create a unique model of using volunteer professional pilots to families who desperately need it. Operating a high performance jet aircraft is expensive and requires a huge amount of resources. Through sponsors, donations and volunteers-these angels in the sky have been serving communities across the US for more than 11 years.
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Girl Scouts of the USA announced that MacKenzie Scott donated $84.5 million—their largest gift ever from one person. The generous grant will help make up for the absence of funds raised from cookie sales and membership during the pandemic. The donation, awarded to GSUSA and 29 local councils including $4.2 million to the Girl Scouts of Minnesota and Wisconsin River Valleys and $4.9 million to Girl Scouts of Greater Los Angeles.
The donation will accelerate GSUSA’s initiatives that give girls the tools to become the next generation of powerful women leaders. The group says the grant will also foster an expanded focus on career readiness and mental wellness. The money will also bolster staff and volunteer training and future-proof its facilities, including the iconic Girl Scout camp properties, including expanding both accessibility and high adventure elements at camp.
“We are so appreciative of MacKenzie Scott’s gift to Girl Scouts. This is a great accelerator for our ongoing efforts to help girls cultivate the skills and connections needed to lead in their own communities and globally,” said Girl Scouts of the USA CEO Sofia Chang. “The support from all our donors, including this generous donation from Ms. Scott, is critical in delivering on our work of reimagination and transformation. We’re excited to prove how Ms. Scott’s investment in girls will change the world—because when one girl succeeds, we all succeed.”
Since the pandemic began, the youth organization’s membership has dropped by 30%: It was a little more than 1 million in 2021-2022, down from roughly 1.4 million in 2019-2020, according to figures the group released last year. Philanthropic contributions are increasingly important, as many people incorrectly assume the Girl Scouts raise enough money to fund itself from cookie sales alone but the organization says the majority of those proceeds stays with local councils and troops.
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What began as a single life jacket loaner booth for boaters to borrow any size preserver before going on the water, has turned into the world’s largest life jacket loaner program. The program, which started in 2008, now operates loaner stations in all 50 states, plus Washington, D.C., American Samoa, and the Virgin Islands—all thanks to a Long Island, New York captain.
Capt. Joe Frohnhoefer kept seeing boating accidents and tragedies that could have been prevented, so he decided to start the nonprofit Sea Tow Foundation in 2007 to provide the education and resources to eliminate them. By the following year, the Life Jacket Loaner program was started to help prevent drownings by providing free life jackets to boaters of any size, that they can borrow and return at the end of their outing.
While Frohnhoefer passed away in 2015, his legacy lives on through the efforts of the foundation and his daughter Kristen, who is now president of the board. The Life Jacket Loaner program reached a huge milestone last month, setting up its 1,000th location at the beach in Clearwater, Florida. Executive Director Gail Kulp said “Since 2008, we’ve distributed over 90,000 life jackets. We believe that financial struggles or lack of access to resources should never be an obstacle to safety.”
Anyone needing a life jacket can check their map of every loaner location, here. Capt. Kahle, the Commander of US Coast Guard in St. Petersburg said “It’s truly game-changing when someone puts on a life jacket. The statistics don’t lie—life jackets save lives.” The foundation website also explains how people can donate life jackets to the program.
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A Florida woman braved the Hurricane Ian flood waters after seeing a stranger’s plea on social media. Christine Bomlitz was distraught as Hurricane Ian swept across southwest Florida and she could not get ahold of her 84 year old mother. Bomlitz said her mother Shirley Affolter had lost her cell phone before the storm and an evacuation vehicle had missed her on its route.
Affolter couldn’t escape on her own because she needed a walker to get around and then her landline went down. Flooding in Englewood had cut her off from her neighbors and the rest of the world. With no way to leave, she hunkered down for the night as Hurricane Ian swept across Florida. Hours passed after Ian drifted out to sea but she still had not heard from her mother.
Bomlitz posted pleas for help on social media — anywhere she could. Can someone check on her mother? “I’ve posted all night on all emergency boards as well as all Englewood storm pages checking on people. If anyone knows anyone in Englewood please give them my cell,” she wrote from her home in Las Vegas, nearly 2,500 miles away from where her mother lives in a retirement community.
Bomlitz’s pleas continued well into Thursday as she looked for someone with a boat to carry her mother and others in the neighborhood to safety. By Thursday afternoon, Good Samaritan Cheynne Prevatt, 26, came to the rescue. Prevatt had also ridden out the storm and her home sustained damage. Hurricane Ian peeled away shingles and caved in part of the ceiling when a palm tree smashed into the roof. She said “Our house didn’t really make it. All of our stuff was packed up, and we were trying to go to my grandmother’s house.” But the Florida resident waded into chest-high floodwaters to search for Affolter.
When Prevatt walked through the door she was relieved to find the woman was alive and safe. Prevatt said: “I didn’t know who she was and she was really kind of surprised to see me.” Mother and daughter were able to speak briefly on the phone but their conversation was cut short because her mom’s hearing aids had stopped working. Prevatt was able to send her a photo of her mom smiling — safe and sound which helped ease her worries. She was soon safely removed by a volunteer who had escorted her through the street’s floodwaters by paddleboard.
Bomlitz relayed in a follow-up post on how eternally thankful she was for the “angel strangers” who swam down the street to check-in on her mother. “The amazing souls, complete strangers, who came together and helped me orchestrate this from Las Vegas is astounding. I am deeply and profoundly moved beyond words by people coming together to help each other in such a way to save lives” she wrote. She commended Prevatt for wading through the waist-high water despite losing her own home in the storm. “It’s been an incredible experience. Words cannot express my sincerest gratitude to everyone. I’m thankful for this stranger, a total stranger. People are amazing.”
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Pro football player James Smith-Williams heard an advocate named Brenda Tracy speak about surviving a rape by college football players while he was a student at North Carolina State University. She shared a message that deeply resonated with him. “Her biggest takeaway was, if you’re a good man, what are you doing to be a good man?’ That really stuck with me” Smith-Williams said.
The 25-year-old defensive end for the Washington Commanders has committed himself to raising awareness and supporting survivors of sexual and domestic violence issues. In 2019, he founded the Champions program of Brenda Tracy’s nonprofit Set The Expectation to create a global network of current and former athletes using the power of their platforms to champion community agencies and groups who serve families and survivors of sexual assault and domestic violence.
The network raises money and awareness for nonprofits that support survivors. To date, Champions have helped raise $117,000 for programs and served over 2,200 children. $80,000 was given directly to local Washington DC survivor support and advocacy programs for their most needed projects. $37,000 went directly to buying items to support local DC drives and events.
James has organized multiple events and taken every opportunity possible to use his platform to raise awareness and give to survivors and their families. During October’s Domestic Violence Awareness Month, he’s supporting the Purple Leash Project, an initiative by Purina and the nonprofit RedRover to help domestic violence shelters become pet-friendly.
Smith-Williams said he got involved with the initiative because he was dismayed to learn that only about 15% of domestic violence shelters currently allow pets and almost half of the people who are in domestic violence situations delay leaving because of their pet. “They have nowhere to go with their pet but pets are family too” he said. James says he fully understands his individual ability to make a difference and the transformational power of athletes coming together for a cause, and it is for this reason that he founded the Champions program.
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A dog lover in Clayton, Yorkshire, has been hailed a hero for using her drone to reunite families with their lost pups. Erica Hart believes she’s rescued more than 200 dogs in the last seven years. She started a Facebook group called ieye drone where users share lost dog posts and Erica heads to missing pups’ last known location to try to locate them. She shares the happy endings on her page.
When a pet owner contacts Hart, she meets them near the last location they were spotted and uses the drone to guide them to their pet. People also post sightings of loose dogs and Hart heads there to help round them up so they can eventually be reunited with their owner. “Once that drone’s above the dog, it’s not going anywhere because I can guide people in quick enough. It’s like a military operation.”
She doesn’t charge any money for the service and says she does it purely for the love of dogs – even if it means spending money on fuel for her car instead of treating herself. “I’ve gone without stuff for myself to put petrol in the car to find a dog. When I post the happy ending on Facebook and I see the comments I lay in bed with a smile on my face and realize why I do it.”
Hart’s work has saved countless animal lives and often, she’s able to quickly cover ground that would take hours for a traditional search team which can make the difference between a safe recovery and a tragic loss.
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The parents of a baby boy who spent 6 months in NICU ask his nurse to become his godmother. Neonatal nurse Carly Miller held back tears when the thankful parents asked and said she feels honored that she will get to be a part of Conrad’s life for years to come. Miller bonded with baby Conrad and his parents, Austyn Evans and Branden Williams, during one of the most challenging times in their lives.
Evans had to deliver Baby Conrad at 35 weeks when doctors told her his heart rate was dropping. They were transferred from Florida to Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston for Conrad’s care where they did not have any local support. Baby Conrad was rushed to the neonatal intensive care unit right after he was born where he met NICU nurse Carly Miller for the first time. For his first five days in the NICU, Miller worked closely with Conrad for “continuity of care.”
Conrad had kidney problems and serious breathing difficulties that required a ventilator. For the first 37 days, Evans and her husband, Branden Williams, could not hold Conrad as he relied on machines to help him become stable and grow. Miller often provided Evans with updates and celebrated with them when they were finally able to hold him for the first time. When doctors planned to move Conrad to another pod so he could start continuous renal replacement therapy, Evans asked if Miller might be able to move to be with Conrad.
At first Miller hesitated because of her lack of experience; this type of dialysis machine was being used for the very first time with the hospital’s NICU patients. Doctors worried that Conrad wouldn’t be able to handle the treatment. While a little wary, Miller agreed to stick with Conrad.
Evans said throughout Conrad’s hospital stay, if the family had questions that Miller didn’t know how to answer, she’d track down the information they needed. Miller’s steady presence at so many crucial moments, such as when Evans first held Conrad, created a bond between the family and the nurse.
When Conrad was leaving the hospital after six months, Evans felt the urge to ask Miller to be his godmother — but she panicked and didn’t ask. “We kept everything as professional as we could in the NICU but just the conversations we had sitting in his hospital room or the victories that we celebrated and we cried over together were really important to me,” Evans said. “Thinking about leaving that place and having to never see Carly again was heart-wrenching.”
Evans invited Miller to come visit and presented her with flowers and a note from Conrad asking her whether she would be his godmother. Before Miller finished reading, she said, “Yes,” much to Evans’ delight. Miller said she feels honored that she will get to be a part of Conrad’s life for years to come.
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