Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire The closest you've ever been to death?

Myself, other than all the dumb near accidents, likely on the 13th of March in 1999 during a stress test.

You good folks?

Nearly got creamed by a train at a crossing just north of Lubbock one night. No flashing signals, no crossing arms. Glad I took a closer look before I went over the tracks.

Hard telling, I've never flatlined but have walked away a lot of times when I shouldn't have. Been hauled on a gurney a few times too.

pretty much every low level flight through the Cascade Mountains, and a few night carrier landings..especially the ones on one engine.

A fine you man from my hometown was killed in a train collision.

when I get too close to a cliff's edge.......

My balls always tingle...as in this pic.....

1200' drop......I know its time to leave

Close as I've ever been

if been shot at 3 times and crushed by a horse

Tried to drive over a mountain, mountain didn’t agree. Busted out the front windshield, went through the passenger window. No broken bones, but 136 stitches in my head later I realized how dumb it was.

Nothing any better than laying in a 2 bed emergency room in a country hospital. Had to have my pillow changed twice while they dealt with the guy next to me. I can tell you that unless you’ve witnessed it you’ll never understand the sounds a humans body can make when someone sticks a .357 mag to their head and tried to kill themselves. They were trying to keep him alive for last rites.

I’ve Been asleep in a tent when you boys rolled through of a night. You want to talk about scaring the piss out of somebody. You guys for the 🏆

Almost got hit head on at about 50mph. Might not have been dead, but might have wished I was. Luckily the old phugg having a seizure glanced down the driver side of my vic, then proceeded to hit a few more cars.....#boomers.

Probably a few other times.

I did race a tornado just north of Lubbock one time...

Quite a relief to come close, and be spared.

3rd night of Desert Storm at 0200 and had just turned inbound over Warbah Island escorting some A-6's into a target in Basrah. No warning just a blast of noise and another jet passed us opposite direction so close the canopy jumped in it's rails (and it was held in place by locking lugs and a pressurization collar.)

Never found out who it was, no call from the E-2 but we figure they came within 15 feet of us. Any closer and they would have hit the vertical stab. We would have never known what hit us. Just would have been a fiery smear across the sky.

Retrieving a dall sheep I shot in the Brooks Range. It’s a lot easier to climb up than down. To this day still don’t understand how I made it off the mountain.

This happened just a couple of weeks ago. I was being treated for a blood clot in my leg. I got up Tuesday@ 0400 AM, and was sitting in my office chair, corresponding with my dear friends on this august forum.

The next thing I knew, I was down on the floor with the office chair on top of me. I had no idea how I got there. KYHillChick was sleeping in the next room and didn't hear me call for help, so I decided to extricate myself. It took a good 10 minutes to maneuver the chair off me, get out away from the desk without tipping over anything and finally get off the floor. I had no pain, no inkling anything was wrong. Whatever I was typing, I'd lost somehow and decided not to retype it, choosing to get a refill on my coffee instead.

Tuesday night, once I was in the Emergency Room, I started to look back on the events of the day. It was when I realized that this was probably when the blood clot broke loose and ended up in my lung. I had no memory of coming out of the chair, because I'd gone out like a light when the clot hit a major vessel and dropped the flow going to my brain. All I remembered was a dull thud. That was my head hitting the carpet.

I spent the next 20 hours flat on my back in the ICU unable to move. They were afraid that it was going to my brain or heart, but they dissolved the clot sufficiently and set me loose late Wednesday afternoon. I was turkey hunting Saturday morning.

Yeah, I have to say that little experience was about as close as you come. No muss, no fuss. If I'd not come to, I'd have never known it. KYHIllChick would have woken up at 0900 and found a big fat blue stiff with an office chair on top of him.

Life comes at you fast sometimes.

Several times, the first when I was playing football at fall scrimmage. Hot humid day I went down with a severe heat stroke. Joints drew up and I couldn't move by the time I arrived at the emergency room. They immediately started pouring 5 gallon buckets of ice on me and administered saline and dextrose IV. Dr. said a few minutes more and there would have been nothing that he could have done to have saved my life.

Another time I was welding on a 23 joint section of 43" pipe, when skid broke and the pipe came off of the skids and rolled on top of me. Luckily the pipe was still on a mat which is all that kept it from crushing me to death. Each joint weighed 20,000 pounds minimum

Was running late for work one day and made a roast beef sandwich to wolf down while getting dressed and tying up my boots. Took a big hurried bite and swallowed before it was chewed up. Hunk of beef got wedged in my throat. I coughed which caused me to lose air but it was still lodged. Was in serious shape. Vision was starting to pixelate, figured I had one shot. Threw myself against the kitchen counter, kind of like a self-heimlich maneuver. Luckily it worked. Just layed on the kitchen floor for a few minutes. That day at work, nothing bothered me, was just damn glad to be alive. Throat hurt for 2 days, my solar plexus hurt for a week.

When I was a teenager my mom sent me to pickup feminine hygene stuff for my sisters, I thought I was going to Die.

Dean

Thanks all, this thought.

When I fell in the garage a couple of years ago. I was laying on the garage floor completely paralyzed including breathing, I thought for sure that I was done.

And no PTSD..........

Mother's Day, 1983. Leading the Formula Ford race at the Westwood Race Track in British Columbia.. Steve Phillip's was 5 seconds behind. He hit a deer and was killed instantly. I never saw the deer. RIP, Steve, you were a great guy.