(U-WIRE) BLACKSBURG, Va. – Professor Liviu Librescu was slight of build and long of tooth, Stephen Schuler said. The sophomore engineering major (who had skipped Librescu’s class Monday morning) was shocked when he first heard that his professor had thrown himself at the door of his Norris classroom, instructing his students to flee out the windows while he held off Cho Seung Hui, the 23-year old shooter who police say terrorized the Virginia Tech campus Monday.
The 76-year-old engineering science and mechanics professor was one of the tales of heroism early Monday. He was also one of 32 fatalities.
For Caroline Merrey, a senior engineering major, the entire horrific sequence flashed by.
“We heard gunshots in the hall and as they were coming closer a student stuck his head out the door and saw what was happening. The next thing I know I’m leaning out the window and Professor Librescru was against the door,” Merrey said. “I really don’t think me or my other classmates would be here if it wasn’t for him.”
Merrey, who landed on her back after jumping from a Norris Hall second-story window, sustained only minor injuries.
The Jerusalem Post reported that Librescu and his father were deported by the Nazis at the onset of World War II; Librescu was sent to a Russian work camp.
Saved by local townspeople, Librescu, a Romanian Jew by birth, became a scientist but struggled under the oppressive regime of Nicolae Ceaucescu until his 1978 immigration to Israel. Librescu came to Virginia during a 1986 sabbatical. He never left.
“He’s a Holocaust survivor. He’s a man who survived one of the worst atrocities in human history only to be gunned down by somebody in his own classroom. It doesn’t make sense. I don’t even know if there’s a word for it. It’s one of these events that makes you think that life is unjust,” said Matt Frank, a junior interdisciplinary studies major and Hillel’s vice president of religion.
Tragically, Librescu lost his life on Yom HaShoah, the day on which Jews all over the world memorialize the Holocaust.
More than 1,000 students joined a variety of Facebook groups honoring Librescu’s heroism. One student and one Israeli national went so far as to post the professor’s professional resume. Members of Librescu’s department backed the professor’s sterling academic credentials.
“His research has enabled better aircraft, superior composite materials and more robust aerospace structures,” said Ishwar K. Puri, the head of the engineering science and mechanics department, told The Associated Press.
The local Jewish community honored Librescu, among others at a Yizkor, a Jewish memorial service for the departed, Tuesday night.
Kevin Granata, a fellow ESM professor, was also killed in the shootings.
Puri described Granata as a “world-class researcher” to The New York Times. A graduate of the Ohio State University and a former faculty member at the University of Virginia, Granata’s recent research focused on “movement dynamics associated with cerebral palsy.

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