A couple who met and survived the devastating Las Vegas mass shooting together have recently announced that they’ve now tied the knot, Metro reported.
Chantal Melanson and Austin Monfort were basically strangers when shots broke out at a music festival back in 2017. But after helping each other escape the gunfire and then continuing to support each other afterwards, the pair eventually fell in love and have since gotten married.
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On September 30, 2017, Austin approached Chantal in a Las Vegas bar.
As it turns out, they were both were in town for the Route 91 Harvest, a three-day country music festival. After chatting for only a few minutes, Chantal said she knew they definitely had a connection.
“It just felt like we knew each other forever,” she told Metro . “We went to grab a bite after the bar and exchanged numbers.”
Just one day later, the couple met up at the festival and were dancing together at 10 PM while Jason Aldean performed on stage.
At that moment, 64-year-old Stephen Paddock opened fire on the crowd of concert-goers from his room at the Mandalay Bay Hotel, injuring 869 people and killing 59 others before turning the gun on himself.
Amid the chaos, Chantal and Austin stayed together as they sought safety from the gunfire.
“Everyone ran in different directions but Austin stayed with me and we ran together,” Chantal recalled. “We ran across the entire festival grounds stopping a few times to get shelter.”
Eventually the pair located a taxi, which they shared with a woman who had been injured and needed to get to the hospital.
“We stayed in the hospital overnight due to lockdown and Austin never left my side,” Chantal said. “He held me throughout the night and kept me safe. After what we had just gone through, he was my safe place.”
After the tragedy, Austin went home to California and Chantal to Canada, but they were determined to remain in contact despite their distance.
“We’ve dealt with everything by focusing on the positive,” Chantal said. “There was a reason we met when we did. We needed each other in this chaos.”
She added, “He was the only person I wanted to talk to. It just felt so right and safe talking to him after what we went through. He told me he would come visit me in Canada.”
Six weeks later, Austin fulfilled his promise and flew to Canada. The pair have been inseparable ever since.
After eighteen months of long-distance dating, Austin popped the question in Laguna Beach, California, and Chantal, of course, said “yes”.
“He brought me to our favorite beach and there was no one around. It was perfect,” she recalled. “His heart was beating out of his chest when he gave me a hug and he got down on one knee and proposed, followed by a beautiful three-course meal.”
For immigration reasons, the pair were married at a courthouse on November 1, 2019, but plan to have a bigger ceremony in Vegas in the near future.
For now, they’re happily married and living together in San Diego, California, where they’re currently under quarantine amid the ongoing outbreak.
As Chantal explained, “[Through] it all, we are just so grateful that we both get to be quarantined together and not in different countries!”
You can follow their love story on their joint Instagram account, @tragedytolove .
h/t: Metro
