Airman Meets Girl He Rescued 10 Years Ago

When Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans in 2005, Staff Sgt. Mike Maroney was one of the many service members who moved in to help. The helicopter crewman became a celebrity of sorts, when an image of him hugging a three-year-old girl he rescued went viral. Long after the image faded from the public eye, Maloney continued to wonder what happened to the child – whose name he did not know. Last month, he and the youngster – L’Shay Brown, were reunited on the BET television show The Real. He is now a master sergeant; she is a straight-A student with aspirations of becoming an attorney, the Daily Mail reported Sept. 22. The reunion happened after an extensive search Maloney conducted on social media, using the hashtag #FindKatrinaKid. Both Maloney and Brown received gifts of $10,000 from The Real.