As if that wasn't hard enough, he lost his leg.
RECERTIFIED as a diver. That was the movie clip I showed.
NOTHING stopped him.
During the bomb recovery operations on March 23, 1966, a line used for towing broke loose, causing a pipe to strike Brashear's left leg below the knee, nearly shearing it off.[SUP][5][/SUP] He was evacuated to Torrejon Air Base in Spain, then to the USAF Hospital at Wiesbaden Air Base, Germany; and finally to the Naval Hospital in Portsmouth, Virginia. Beset with persistent infection and necrosis, his lower left leg was eventually amputated.
Brashear remained at the Naval Regional Medical Center in Portsmouth from May 1966 until March 1967 recovering and rehabilitating from the amputation. From March 1967 to March 1968, Brashear was assigned to the Harbor Clearance Unit Two, Diving School, preparing for return to full active duty and diving.[SUP][6][/SUP] In April 1968, after a long struggle, Brashear was the first amputee diver to be (re)certified as a U.S. Navy diver.[SUP][7][/SUP] In 1970, he became the first African-American U.S. Navy Master Diver, and served ten more years beyond that, achieving the rating of Master Chief Boatswain's Mate in 1971.[SUP][1][/SUP][SUP][8][/SUP] Brashear was motivated by his beliefs that "It's not a sin to get knocked down; it's a sin to stay down" and "I ain't going to let nobody steal my dream".
we need more men like him