No fancy costume, no cape, no superhero mask, just a genuinely selfless man with a kind heart that’s always ready to help.
The society that we live in today oftentimes neglects homeless people, they are given little to almost no opportunity in life. The worse part is that people would still look down on them despite their helpless situation. They live every single day of their lives under such a predicament that’s too hard to handle and get away with.
But remember what the famous quote says, “Those with less give more”. This has already been proven and tested by quite a number of social experiments done by people who are uploading these kinds of videos online. These people go to public places and test people’s honesty and generosity, and it turns out that homeless people act better than most people who have more in life.
This story, though, is not a social experiment- it’s an absolute reality.
His name is Keith Walker, 53, a homeless man with nothing much in life, however, he’s proven to a lot of people that he doesn’t need to have superhuman strength or ability just to be called a “hero”. His story of heroism will move you to the innermost of your totality as a human being.
He let the dogs and cats out – for their safety.
Just last year, on December 18, a week before Christmas, a fire broke at the kitchen of W-Underdogs shelter in Atlanta, Georgia. Walker, though was scared, recklessly rushed inside the burning place to save the animals trapped inside.
“I was nervous as hell, I’m not going to lie,” Walker told CNN. “I was really scared to go in there with all that smoke. But God put me there to save those animals.”
“If you love a dog, you can love anyone in the world. My dog is my best friend, and I wouldn’t be here without him, so I knew I had to save all those other dogs.”
He sure knew the danger of going inside a burning establishment, but he also knew there’s nobody left to save those poor animals inside so he decided to jump into action.
Walker wasted no time because he knew that the situation was crucial during that time.
According to Gracie Hamlin, founder of W-Underdogs, “even the firefighters didn’t want to handle the dogs. They called animal control, but Keith was already in the building pulling out the cats and dogs until they were all safe.”
A miracle happened!
Thankfully, Walker was able to successfully rescue all the animals inside the shelter, which included 6 dogs and 10 cats!
Everyone from the W-Underdogs team was beyond grateful and thankful to all the people, especially to Walker, who helped them during the unfortunate incident. On a Facebook post, they wrote:
“Tonight we thank our guardian angels. The homeless man that ran into our burning house and rescued our animals. “
Victoria Stilwell, a celebrity dog trainer and founder of the Victoria Stilwell Academy for Dog Training & Behavior, said Walker was homeless since he was 13. Stilwell is also a member of the advisory board of W-Underdogs.
“He faces the many challenges of homelessness but he loves his dog,” Stilwell told Bored Panda.
Turns out fate also played an important role in the incident because that day, when he saw the fire at the facility, Walker was on his way to pick up his pit bull, Bravo. The people at the W-Underdogs know Walker because they are letting him keep his dog at the shelter every night.
“Bravo is a large, male pitbull with a load of energy and a friendly personality. He is very strong but very loving. He is much loved,” Stilwell said.
Looking at the brighter side.
W-Underdogs was just a week away from moving to their new facility when the fire incident happened. They are now keeping all the animals safe and well in the new place.
This story doesn’t only highlight Walker saving the animals from the shelter, it also proves to us all that anyone can be a hero in their own way, may it be just a simple gesture or as big as saving an animal’s life. Hopefully, this story gets to reach more people across the world, so more and more would step up and help when it’s badly needed.
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