#FindKatrinaKid Air Force Katrina rescuer searches for girl he saved in 2005
'If I never do anything else again, that hug and that smile made it all worthwhile'
HELP US OUT TWITTER: This Vet wants to find a kid he saved 10 yrs ago during <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/HurricaneKatrina?src=hash">#HurricaneKatrina</a> <a href="http://t.co/atDnIgfnwj">http://t.co/atDnIgfnwj</a> <a href="http://t.co/S3Lmh6AqYc">pic.twitter.com/S3Lmh6AqYc</a>
—@adegrandpreThe little girl in the above photo was saved by then U.S. Staff Sargent Michael Maroney in 2005. She was rescued from a rooftop after Hurricane Katrina slammed New Orleans nearly 10 years ago.
"When she wrapped me up with that hug, I just melted, and the weight of the world was lifted off my shoulders," Maroney, 40, told ABC News. "Everything in the world just stopped, and I wasn’t in New Orleans or in the devastation, I was just being hugged by a beautiful little girl."
On Maroney's Youtube channel, he recently describes the girl as being about 4 or 5 in August 2005. He remembers her as being one of a family of seven people that included the mother, father and five children.
Air Force Times first reported Maroney's story Sunday night. Maroney, a father of two, recalls lifting the family members one by one to the safety of an evacuation helicopter— but he says he never got the family’s or the little girl’s name.
"This little girl is so happy," Maroney said in his YouTube video, in which he details his time in New Orleans and the rescue. "She's flying on a helicopter, she doesn't even know her whole house and everything just got wiped out."
Maroney hopes to eventually track her down and reconnect. "I’ve thought about her and her family every day,” he said. "I just want to let her know how much she's inspired me and to see how she’s doing."