Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire What the closest you have come to the end.

I was eating this McDonalds biscuit this one time....

That's about it. I try not to risk my life jumping motorcycles, racing cars, or heavy drinking anymore.

Fell out of a deer stand 6 yrs ago today.

I remember that, you were a broken man.

I've dodged the grim reaper 8 times, I more careful theses days........

Got shot at when I was 17, grazed my arm. Various car wrecks and potentially serious illnesses.

Various farm accidents when I was a kid that could have easily killed me. Lost part of a coverall sleeve to a live PTO shaft - only thing that saved me was my coveralls were so ragged the PTO shucked a chunk of the sleeve off my arm like an ear of corn. Had three levels of tier rails in a tobacco barn fall on my head, walked away from that one without any broken bones but one whopper of a concussion. Had a broken disc blade come flying out of a Bush Hog like a frisbee, missed my head by inches. That one shook me up. I can still hear that disc blade singing past my ear.

This one sticks out as I was sitting in it when tree fell talking to my son that was standing on the porch!!!

Had a 12 ga. slug hit the tree I was in less than a foot above my head. Fired by a stone drunk jackass that was shooting at a bambi that had ran under my stand. I think I was 14 at the time. It almost ruined deer hunting for me forever.

Heading to work one morning a guy fell asleep and crossing the median hit me head on, broke my neck, doctor said another 1/16 of an inch and I wouldn't be here. Have C3,4,5 fused together. That was in 1999. No real issues, God has sure blessed me, finished working in the oil patch 2 years ago. Living the dream.

My massive heart attack back in 2012.

Yep that wasn't and still isn't fun. I do wear a harness these days when in a climbing stand.

8 times...... You're like a cat...... Uh-Oh, only 1 life left...... be extra careful!

A 1975 Honda XL 250. A Dodge pick-up truck started across right in front of me. I was doing 60 mph (give or take a couple), the rear brake had just locked and started to drift to the left, at impact. Front wheel hit right front of truck, this turned me and bike to left. I hit the door with my left side, and was out for a few moments. My first impulse was to get up, until some people stopped me, and attempt to kick this guy’s @$$.

I’m guessing impact speed @ around 50 mph. Other than major bruising and a pretty badly sprained/strained ankle....I pretty much walked away from it! Thank God, Dodge had really thin sheet metal back then!

Much the same as other folks, several opportunities, perhaps this was the highest probability of death! memtb

About 5 years ago, I casually tried to swallow a piece of elk steak without fully chewing it. It lodged in my throat and after about 10 seconds I thought I was a goner. I ran downstairs to my wife, she quickly saw what was going on, called for our teenage son and miracuosly the steak came up a few moments later. I was LUCKY.

Quite a few...
Shot in the hip...holster and weapon saved me.

Shot at and the windshield pillar took the round instead of my bean.

I was in field training and hadn’t learned the importance of ALWAYS knowing your exact location. Chased a hood rat into a house and the door closed behind me. The living room was filled with his family members who thought my head was a soccer ball as I was fighting with him.

Had a river bank give out under me as I was watching a flood in my youth. Caught a tree root on the slide down. My little brother pulled me up.

Can’t remember the rest...there’s been a bunch.

Too many - a 360 rollover while instinctively avoiding a 2 a.m deer in WY. A head on into a rock wall opposite side of road here on the Kenai (black ice/shaded corner), with the 4-Runner ending up on it's roof, back on our side of the road, pointing back the way we came. Others.

The one that still gives me the creeps is again ice-related F150 spun out with 10 foot iron pole (for meter install) in back. Went into opposite side ditch backwards, tail end of pole hit embankment, projected pole forward, taking out drivers side mirror. I can feel that thing coming thru the base of my skull....

The one that bothers me least (not at all), was bouncing the binocs off a charging grizzly at 9 feet. Closer to "fond memory"....

A few closes ones in traffic that could have ended very badly. The one that made me chitt a golden brick was having 2 full maned lions jump out of the thick riverine brush 30 feet from me in Tanzania. I was unarmed at the time and it's a good thing they didn't really want me......

Wait.... was ice skating on a lake in Michigan when I was about 10, the ice broke and I went under. If it had not been shallow enough for me stand and stick my head out of the hole, I'd never have met those lions. That was bad.......

I've nearly had it on several occasions. The following was the most spectacular.

I was in Fisher Ridge back in '83, on a mapping expedition with the National Speleological Society. I went down the hole with 4 other experienced cavers. At that time Fisher Ridge was not considered part of Mammoth. The mapping expedition I was on was supposed to map the connection between Fisher and the next ridge over. In succeeding years that ridge connected with Mammoth.

The group split into two parties. Party 1, two cavers, were supposed to use hand tools to open up a hole that had been blowing, indicating a large passage on the other side. My group, myself and two others, were sent to map the farthest push so far. We went in about 10 AM with a set of dry clothes bagged up. The water in the creek was cold, and we needed the dry clothes once we got in.

Were were about 2.5 hours from the exit in the mid-afternoon. I was pushing a passage alone, crab walking backwards on a shelf, about 5 feet above the floor. About 80 yards in, a blow blew out my carbide light. While I was relighting it, a blow in the other direction occurred. When I got back to my companions, they were half pissing themselves. The rapid changes in barometric pressure spelled bad things going on topside. We started running for the exit.

Where it had been drips coming from the ceiling, there were now torrents. The exit passage was a 100 foot hands-n-knees crawl through influx water. The passage was filling fast. I went first, and when I got about 10 feet from the mouth of the cave, I found the cave had sumped shut. I turned on my back and kissed the ceiling, found a pocket of air and started swimming. I came out into a massive thunderstorm. The two guys behind me got out. The two guys in the other party did not.

I was left at the mouth of the cave to help the two left in. My two guys went for help. I was standing at the mouth of the cave 20 minutes later when a wall of water came down the valley. I had to scramble out in a hurry to save myself from being sucked in. That was about 6 PM.

I stripped and sat under a poncho on the hillside overlooking the entrance. About 11 PM another round of thunderstorms hit. I suddenly felt a sizzle on the back of my head. A second later, lightning hit an oak tree about 10 yards to my right. That was IT! I walked out and met the rescue party about a half-hour later, about 10 minutes from the truck. I told them the entrance was sumped shut and anyone in that part of the cave was drowned.

I got cleaned up and spent the rest of the night sitting up with the supposed widow of one of the unlucky ones at a Jerry's. At daybreak, a party was sent in from another entrance. 15 hours later, they came out with the two stranded cavers. They had tried to make it out, got caught in the flood, and had to beat it back to a high spot a few hours in and wait. They had crawled into their garbage bags and lit their last candle, trying to fend off hypothermia before the rescue party got to them.

Three jams in 12 hours. Surprisingly, I kept caving with the NSS for another year after that.

All mostly young & dumb self inflicted stuff. I was a speed demon & have certainly used up most of my nine.

A trip one day on a 750 Honda with a State Trooper chasing me & trying to close the gap had me realizing later, on just how stupid I was being. I didn't get caught, but had at least 3 of my closest calls ever, & I'd had many.

Had a brain bleed, heart stopped, EMT's got it going again on the way to the hospital.

I was with my son, ice fishing. I broke completely through and fully submerged. My son sensed something wrong. Turned and looked. He ran to the hole and grabbed material on my coat and yanked me out. I was so cold, I couldn't speak. He got me to shore and started the truck. He stripped me down to my long johns and got the heater to warm me along with hot coffee. Another time I was on top of our Thompson 24' fishing boat while it was on the trailer. I slipped and fell to the ground. I hit my head on a snowmobile trailer then hit on on a length of angle iron on the ground I was not breathing and he did CPR on me while my wife called an ambulance. I made it both times cause here I am.

Two head on collisions with one dead in the other vehicle in both. I fell 18ft. off a roof when the extension ladder came unlatched while moving it over along the edge. The guy at the bottom of the ladder managed to turn me over so I didn't land on my head.
Stuck my tongue out at a first grade bully at a street corner on the way to school. He pushed me off the curb and I bit off my tongue when I landed face down. Almost bled to death on that one.
Got hit by a car on my bicycle and got tossed 15-20 feet into the ditch.
A crane lift went wrong and the machinery parts on the pallet spilled of and came down on the deck of the Carry Deck crane I was operating, the double 80 chain sprocket bounced and came almost came through the windshield of the little cab.
Had to fight my way out of a robbery/murder attempt.

Damn, that's a helluva way to go.