Hero is a dog who has lived up to his name many times throughout his incredible life.

His story begins back in 2007, when the German Shepherd was a stray living in the woods of Georgia. One day, Hero was wandering around when he came upon the wrecked car of Shannon Lorio, who had just crashed her vehicle.

Shannon had gone out for a drive to clear her head after a fight with her husband, but she ended up on a far windier road than she had anticipated. She soon lost control of her car, and as the vehicle fishtailed, Shannon was thrown out of the driver’s seat window. She blacked out for a minute, and when she woke up, half of her body was trapped underneath the crushed car.

Since she had ended up far off the road when she crashed, Shannon immediately feared that nobody would find her, but then she saw Hero.

“I don’t know when I came to, but when I did come to, I felt his huge presence,” she recalled. “I could feel his breath. The dog…I don’t know how he came across me, but I thank God that he did.”

Shannon then passed out again, and when she woke up, she was stunned to find that the German Shepherd had gotten her out from underneath the car. Grabbing her by the hood, Hero had managed to drag her away from the vehicle, moving her over 100 feet to the edge of the road.

Hero’s strength inspired Shannon, and she wrapped her arms around him, allowing him to help her stand up.

Hero had gotten Shannon to the road at just the right time, because a car was about to drive by. She was able to flag down the driver and have him call an ambulance for her before she passed out for a third time.

This time, Shannon woke up in the hospital, where she was told that she would not need surgery. As she went home to recover, she could not stop thinking about the dog who had saved her life.

“This dog, he did everything. He’s an amazing animal, he really is,” Shannon said.

Hero was taken in by the Humane Society after he saved Shannon, and when his story went viral, he was adopted by canine search-and-rescue trainer named Heidy Drawdy. She then trained him to be a search and rescue dog, and he’s spent the years since then saving countless lives!

Shannon is happy that Hero has become a search and rescue dog, as she knows it is the perfect job for him. Over the years, she’s reunited with him many times to thank him for saving her life. In fact, it was Shannon who named him Hero!

“I told him you’ll always be my hero,” she said. “That’s what everybody started to call him. And that’s how he got his name.”

Find out more about Hero’s amazing story in the video below!