Faith Karimi of CNN is reporting three Americans Anthony Sadler, Alex Skarlatos, Spencer Stone along with a French National and Briton, subdued a would-be terrorist on a high-speed train traveling from Paris to Amsterdam. The three lifelong friends were traveling on vacation when the suspect boarded the train and cocked his AK-47. They were able to subdue the man, who kept pulling out weapons, including a box cutter, injuring Stone in the process. Skarlatos and Stone were off-duty U.S. military staff. Accolades from world leaders have poured in because it is believed the actions of the five men saved what would have more than likely been a massacre. The suspected gunman, Ayoub El Khazzani, is a Moroccan national, a senior European official said.
Karimi writes:
“Sadler, a senior at California State University in Sacramento, was on his first trip to Europe when terror struck. When his friends jumped the gunman and took him down, he and another passenger helped restrain him and ensure he stayed down.
‘The three of us beat up the guy,’ Sadler said. ‘In the process, Spencer gets slashed multiple times by the box cutter, and Alek takes the AK away.’
Sadler helped tie up the suspect then went to other train cars to reassure passengers, said Jean-Hugues Anglade, a French actor who was traveling with his family.
He ‘came running into our car, yelling that the shooter was overpowered by American soldiers on leave, that everything was fine,’ Anglade told French magazine Paris Match. ‘He reassured us, he looked for survival blankets and a first aid kit for two seriously injured people.’
It’ll be hard to top his first trip to Europe and his final year in college.
‘I’m just a college student, it’s my last year in college. I came to see my friends on my first trip in Europe and we stopped a terrorist, it’s kind of crazy,’ Sadler told CNN.
He urged people to be proactive during such situations. ‘The gunman would have been successful if my friends had not gotten up,’ he said.”
French President Francois Hollande bestowed the Legion of Honor on the five heroes, which is France’s highest honor.
Read about the other heroes at CNN.com.
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