WATCH – ‘All Aboard!’: Nine-Year-Old with Heart Defect Becomes Chicago Train Operator for a Day

Amy Furr

The Make-A-Wish Foundation made something incredible happen for a nine-year-old boy in Chicago, Illinois, on Monday.

Idris Lockett has always wanted to be a train operator on the Chicago Transit Authority’s Green Line, according to ABC 7. Thanks to help from the foundation, he got to take his loved ones on a special journey from Austin through the Loop.

“I can’t describe it in words. I just feel a lot of emotion, overwhelming,” said his mother, Catherine Campbell. “If anyone knows Idris, we call him hero. He absolutely loves the CTA train. He’ll pick the CTA train over Chuck E. Cheese any day.”

Video footage of the special day shows the little boy boarding the train and assisting the adult operator along the journey:

Campbell said that when her son was born, doctors diagnosed him with hypoplastic left heart syndrome and he has since had three surgeries.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the syndrome is “a birth defect that affects normal blood flow through the heart.”

“As the baby develops during pregnancy, the left side of the heart does not form correctly. Hypoplastic left heart syndrome is one type of congenital heart defect. Congenital means present at birth,” the agency said.

Prior to Lockett’s train journey, he got to tell passengers at the station, “All aboard!” as he spoke into a phone. Moments later, he threw his head back and laughed with joy as everyone clapped:

“He’s been through whole a lot, a whole lot, but he’s still here. You wouldn’t know just by looking at him. We call him Hero. We gave him that name before he was even born. So it’s very fitting for him. He’s a hero,” Campbell told WGN News.

According to the ABC report, the little boy’s family expressed their gratitude to the CTA for making the day possible.

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