Ten years ago Wednesday, Big Tex burned.
And there was no saving him.
A reported electrical fire sent the State Fair of Texas icon up in flames, nearly incinerating him into a heap of ashes. Only a fried skeleton of the famed cowboy and his waving hands were left in the end.
And if you don't think Big Tex means a lot to some people, just go back and look at our coverage from the day it happened.
The scene at the fair was akin to a funeral.
WFAA's David Schechter, reporting from the fairgrounds, described fairgoers "gravitating" toward what was left of Big Tex, taking photographs and video "almost in a sense of loss and mourning, strange as it may seem."
"It's became quite a spectacle, and, really, for Texas, a bit of a national tragedy if you can call it that," Schechter reported.