Celebrity Heroes - Maria Bello Prevents Emergency Landing (GALLERY)

Maria Bello may not be an A-list actress yet, but the starlet from “The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor” certainly isn’t afraid to lend a hand to those in need, even as she works her way up the Hollywood ladder.

The 41 year old actress recently helped someone suffering from a severe panic attack on a flight. On her way from LA to NYC, someone on the plane was going through such intense panic, the pilot was considering making an emergency landing. Thanks to Maria Bello, they didn’t have to.

“The flight attendants didn’t know what to do,” Bello told Fox news.  “But weirdly enough I did because I’ve had a lot of mental illness around me in my life. It was really scary. They thought they were going to have to make an emergency landing. It made me feel really happy that I’d had these experiences with other people and knew what to do.”

In the Mummy, Bello stars as the wife of Rock O’Connell, played by Brendan Fraser.

If you’re thinking Maria Bello looks awfully familiar, it’s because she’s actually starred in numerous films, including Coyote Ugly in which she played the badass owner of a bar where “Coyote” girls would come to dance for drunk patrons. Since then she’s been a Golden Globe nominee for Best Supporting Actress in The Cooler and Best Actress in A History of Violence.

Bello is currently working on her next film, The Private Lives of Pippa Lee, set to hit theatres in 2009.