Louis Zamperini: Aircraft Accidents In WWII

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In WWII, most deaths in the AAF were from non-battle situations such as accidents and disease. One statistic shows that between November 1, 1943, and May 25, 1945, 70 percent of men killed in action actually died from aircraft accidents. Most men did not actually die in a combat situation. Because of these airplane accidents many men did not die in the crash died in a life raft from starvation and dehydration as they drifted aimlessly over the Pacific Ocean. The men that lived through the crash and survived on a raft just to be captured by the Japanese were put in POW camps for the remainder of the war. One of these men is Louis Zamperini, an Olympic athlete and track star from Torrance, California. His plane went down due to a malfunction …show more content…

Louis had it harder than most others as the “Bird”, one of the most erratic and evil men he would ever meet, targeted him because of his strong will and stubbornness. The “Bird” would beat him almost every day for even looking at him wrong. Something that one of the POWs has said about the Bird is, “He was absolutely the most sadistic man I ever met”(Hillenbrand 237). This quote that is talking about the Bird shows that the man that hated Louis the most was also one of the worst people that Louis would ever meet. Louis was so scared of him that when he was transported to another POW camp and saw that the Bird was the commanding officer there he fainted. Another quote to emphasize the pain and suffering that Louis went through is, “But on Kwajalein, the guards sought to deprive them of something that had sustained them even as all else had been lost: dignity. This self-respect and sense of self-worth, the innermost armament of the soul, lies at the heart of humanness; to be deprived of it is to be dehumanized, to be cleaved from, and cast below, mankind”(Hillenbrand 182). This quote shows how after the guards had took everything from Louis the only thing left was his dignity and if they took then there would be nothing left in Louis that would have been able to really be alive. Louis enduring these beating and keeping his dignity through it all is extremely difficult and only adds to the admiration that he has already earned from the previous quotes. Louis’ ability to survive and remain unbroken in his will and spirit is very admirable and is a big part of why his story is so

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