Students rebuilt a wrecked car. A Navy veteran got the keys.

A US Navy veteran in Minneapolis who went more than two years without a car now has a refurbished 2020 Hyundai Elantra, rebuilt by students at Dunwoody College of Engineering. Robert Hanson, who flew as a Navy airman from 1993 to 1997, lives with severe asthma and fibromyalgia that make public transit hard. He had been walking to get food. A Hennepin County welfare service referred him to the Recycled Rides for Schools program, run through the National Auto Body Council. The Elantra came from Allstate, which recovered it after a collision that took out a good portion of its front end. Students in the college's Automotive Collision and Refinishing program spent months on the body work before meeting the man it was for. "I'm just blown away and so thankful to everybody involved," Hanson said. He called it a game changer, mostly because he can finally buy groceries in bulk.