While some people might give smartphones a bad rap for their distracting nature, people are rejoicing over a photo of an anxious soldier who was transfixed by his cell phone at a Texas airport.
And it’s not because he was dawdling on social media – it’s because he was watching a live video stream of his daughter’s birth.
Specialist Brooks Lindsey had been training at the Fort Bliss military base in preparation for his deployment to Kuwait with the Army National Guard when he received noticed that his pregnant wife was having an emergency induction.
His wife Haley had been diagnosed with high blood pressure and preeclampsia, a potentially dangerous birth complication, during a routine doctor’s appointment the previous day. When she was on her way to the hospital the following day, doctors told her that they wanted to deliver the baby as soon as possible.
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Haley, who lives in Mississippi, immediately took the necessary steps to tell her husband about the birth.
Brooks rushed to the airport only to find that his flight had been delayed. As he was waiting at the gate, his mother FaceTimed him so he could watch the birth of his daughter through video chat.
Other travelers who were waiting on the delayed flight heard about Brooks’s predicament so when they all finally heard the newborn baby cry out, the passengers cheered for the new dad.
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Tracy Dover, who was one of the cheering bystanders, had snapped a photo of the emotional soldier and posted it to social media where it was shared thousands of times.
“When we heard the baby cry, we all rejoiced for him,” says Dover. “I wanted to share this because I never want us to forget about our soldiers who serve us every day and the sacrifices they make.”
The story has a silver lining, too – Brooks’s family agrees that if the flight had not been delayed, he would have been in the air during the birth, thus making the nerve-wracking incident a “blessing in disguise”.
(WATCH the heartwarming video below)