They were three childhood friends on a European vacation, riding a train to Paris. Then a gunman with an assault rifle, a pistol and a box cutter opened fire in their carriage — and the three of them did the thing nobody is trained to expect from tourists. They charged him.
On August 21, 2015, aboard Thalys train 9364 from Amsterdam to Paris, the attack began. The three friends were Airman Spencer Stone, 23; Oregon National Guardsman Alek Skarlatos, 22, just back from Afghanistan; and student Anthony Sadler, 23. They were not a unit. They were not on duty. They were three young men on holiday who had known each other since childhood — and when the moment came, they moved together like they’d rehearsed it.
The charge, and the man who wouldn’t let go
Stone reached the gunman first and tackled him. In the fight, the box cutter nearly took Stone’s thumb. And they weren’t alone in the carriage’s courage: British passenger Chris Norman joined the struggle, and French-American professor Mark Moogalian — who had confronted the gunman — was shot and survived.
Then came the detail that defines Spencer Stone’s day. The fight was over, the gunman was subdued — and Stone, bleeding from his own wounds, went to Moogalian and held pressure on the professor’s neck wound, keeping him alive. A man who had just nearly lost a thumb spent the minutes after the attack as a medic, with his injured hand, for a stranger.
That is the complete picture of heroism: not just the charge, but the care afterward, from a man who was himself a casualty of the same three minutes.
France’s highest honor
On August 24, 2015 — three days later — President François Hollande awarded Stone, Skarlatos, Sadler and Norman the Légion d’honneur, France’s highest decoration. The three Americans later received honorary French citizenship in 2019, and played themselves in Clint Eastwood’s film of the attack.
Three friends who got on a train as tourists got off it as men France decorated at the highest level it has. Every parent who has ever told a child “look out for your friends” should know this story’s ending: the friendship WAS the rescue plan. They charged because none of them could imagine charging alone — so nobody had to.
Join the conversation
Three friends, no uniforms, no orders — they just ran TOWARD it together. Honestly: do you have the friends who would move when you move? And what does Stone holding a stranger’s wound with his own injured hand say to you? Tell us below.
Source note: The Thalys train account — August 21, 2015, aboard train 9364 from Amsterdam to Paris; the gunman armed with an assault rifle, a pistol and a box cutter; Airman Spencer Stone (23), Oregon National Guardsman Alek Skarlatos (22, just back from Afghanistan) and student Anthony Sadler (23) charging him, alongside British passenger Chris Norman and French-American professor Mark Moogalian, who was shot and survived; Stone tackling the gunman first, nearly losing his thumb to the box cutter, then holding pressure on Moogalian’s neck wound while bleeding himself; President François Hollande awarding the Légion d’honneur to Stone, Skarlatos, Sadler and Norman on August 24, 2015; and the three Americans’ later honorary French citizenship (2019) and playing themselves in Clint Eastwood’s film — is from the U.S. Army (army.mil) account, BBC reporting (August 2015), and AFP on the 2019 citizenship ceremony.
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