Last week, at the Hollywood International Airport, Fort Lauderdale, Florida, a man opened fire on the public, killing five and injuring eight. One witness of the incident claims his MacBook “saved [him] from a certain death.”
AppleInsider reports:
“Steve Frappier, a witness to Friday’s deadly shooting at a Fort Lauderdale airport, revealed in an interview with CNN that an Apple MacBook Pro in his backpack took a stray bullet during the harrowing scene, […] saving his life.”
The incident occurred at the baggage claim area. Video footage shows a man in a blue t-shirt simply pulling out a pistol and shooting at unsuspecting passengers. “When the gunman opened fire, everyone scrambled to take cover,” recalls Steve, adding, “It was total chaos.”
Steve said the moment he saw what was happening, he immediate fell to his knees and assumed a “tortoise” posture. His backpack, with the MacBook in it, sat on top of him like a tortoise shell. And just like a shell, it saved his life. He says he did feel something hitting his back, but didn’t know it was a bullet until later when he opened the bag.
Astonishingly, the bullet had passed the MacBook and come to rest in an inside front pocket of his backpack!
The perp has been identified as Esteban Santiago, 26, a native of Alaska. When in custody, he reportedly said “the voices in my head asked me to join ISIS and shoot those people.”
However, even that doesn’t justify the horror of the whole incident, where he took the life of five people. Five families were destroyed that day, for no fault of their own, except for the misfortune of being in the wrong place, at the wrong time. For that, there’s no justification whatsoever.
Not everyone gets as lucky as Steve Frappier, and it’s not every day that a MacBook takes a bullet for you. We can only be grateful that Apple chose to build their computers in an aluminium unibody. Who knew their innovation and design would one day end up saving someone’s life.
