It wasn’t all bad
■ Richard Fierro, the 45-year-old Army veteran who subdued the Club Q gunman in November, served as grand marshal in the Colorado Springs Pride Parade last week. Fierro and his family had gone to Club Q to see a drag show when a man stormed in with a semiautomatic rifle, shooting 22 people before Fierro tackled him. “I’m humbled beyond belief to be accepted into the community and asked as a straight dude to grand marshal their parade,” Fierro said. The march’s theme this year was the power of resilience.
■ To keep their muscles strong and stimulate their brains and bodies, the 12 elephants at the Houston Zoo practice sessions of “elephant yoga” every day. The training, which lasts between 30 seconds and five minutes, includes lifting their front and back legs and stretching out on the ground. Baby elephants start training soon after birth, and although these personalized yoga sessions are not mandatory, elephants get treats like bread, cantaloupe, or raisins for taking part in the exercises, which let trainers observe their entire bodies. Some elephants are more flexible than others. The champion is Tess, a 40-year-old, 6,500-pound pachyderm who can prop her body entirely on her front legs to do an elephant handstand.
■ Washington state firefighters rescued a 12-year-old boy who fell 20 feet down a well, clinging to a plastic pipe to keep himself afloat. The boy was playing on top of the well’s concrete lid during church recess when it suddenly collapsed. Despite hypothermia and lacerations, he remained conscious while partially submerged in water. Firefighters sent down a helmet and a life vest and undertook a rescue operation, delicately removing the remains of the concrete lid as it kept collapsing. They were then able to lower a ladder, and the boy—whose name was not released—climbed to safety.