“WHAT WOULD YOU DO IF YOUR VERY FIRST DAY AT A NEW JOB MEANT SAVING 165 STRANGERS FROM DEATH?” It was July 4th in Texas Hill Country when the Guadalupe River became something unrecognizable — a violent, churning force that devoured homes and swept away everything people had built. Families clung to treetops. Children screamed from rooftops surrounded by rising water. Then, cutting through the chaos, a helicopter appeared. Scott Ruskan — a former accountant from New Jersey who’d traded spreadsheets for something far more dangerous — was about to face his very first rescue mission. He plunged into the floodwaters repeatedly, coordinating twelve helicopters, pulling person after person from the river’s grip. Among those rescued was eleven-year-old Milly Cate, who had just finished praying when she looked up and saw what she quietly called “a miracle” descending from the sky. Ruskan later received the Legion of Merit before a standing Congress. But it was something Milly Cate whispered that night — something small, something deeply human — that no one who heard it has ever quite forgotten.
Coast Guard Hero Scott Ruskan Honored After Saving 160+ Lives in Devastating Texas Floods On July 4, catastrophic flash flooding…