It was on the New in WV. At Miller’s Folly at extremely low water. I knew I was too far right but kept hitting rocks that would have been well submerged at normal levels but were at the surface at low flow and couldn’t get to the prefered line.
I’ve paddled the Yough a few times, where was your incident?
As a kid, I was chased by a bear, although it turned out to be just a warning because it would have caught me if it wanted to. But in those few panicked seconds, a newspaper headline popped into my head, “Boy Killed By Bear”.
Twice.
Over ten years ago my heart went into A-fib for over 24 hours. The thought of dying did cross my mind but mostly went away after I finally got myself to the hospital. Never happened again.
Had a few incidents where a rocket exploded decently close. Close enough that my body reacted and took cover long before my brain even registered the noise. Happened once when I was asleep. Found myself on the floor taking cover (such as it was) before I woke up.
I had a major car crash. I’ve written about it a few times. The seatbelt and the car’s crumple zones saved my life.
Some days seem to be good days, and I eat. Other days I can tell things aren’t going well, and I just don’t eat much. Some foods just don’t work any more. For example, leftover turkey on a sandwich. I love them, and I put on lots of mayo. But they stick. I made a cake tonight and tasted it. It sticks.
If I don’t have a glass of something next to me, I don’t eat. When my water is gone in a restaurant, I put my fork down until I can get the waitress to give me more. I’ve seen a speech pathologist for helpful hints, and take really small bites, chew like crazy, then swallow a lot of water.
I guess I’m used to it. I wasn’t always this way, but I had a lot of radiation on my throat about 40 years ago and year by year it gets a little worse.
Girl Scout picnic, age 9 or so – while playing “how many marshmallows can you stuff in your mouth” I was startled and a quick intake of air caused me to choke on the cocoa coating and gasp for air, creating a marshmallow suction completely blocking my trachea. Luckily my mother was there and I managed to stagger over to her as things were going black and I knew this was what death was about. She figured out the crisis by the look on my face, scooped me up and body slammed me down on a picnic table. She made me breathe again by sheer force of will.
Philmont Scout Ranch, age 22 – I woke up to a bear scratching at my tent right by my head. I had a 1 1/2" Buck knife and decided if he/she managed to get in I’d cut a slit in the opposite side and push the Explorer Scout I was bunking with out. Before I could register “gonna die” it wandered off to rummage though some backpacks and I yelled to the other campers in our group that it wasn’t a good time for a potty outing.
A wooded pasture, age 32 – long story short, a horse ran away with me and I came off, head first, on to frozen ground. The impact caused this still, calm statement in my head, “Well, I’m dead.” A moment or so later I took a ragged, painful breath and that thought was replaced with, “Shit, I’m not dead!”
The best part of the ensuing “rescue” was when I was lying in melting snow waiting for the ambulance and all I could see were the ankles of people standing around. A young girl crouched down into my field of vision and said, “Is all that blood yours?” and offered to put her coat over me because I was shivering. Awwww, how sweet is that?
Few years back, I was hitching a ride on a KC-135 (picture an old Boeing 707 airliner with no windows, seats, overhead luggage bins, in-flight snack (unless you brought them with you), and one very grumpy enlisted boom operator instead of a flight attendant (but feel free to keep calling him “Stewardess”, they like that, really!)
Anyways, picture all that, and it’s still not quite the same thing, but close enough. Basically a stripped-out airliner airframe with some refueling equipment in the very back. There’s me and probably 50 other people sitting on the web seating against the walls, with all of our luggage strapped down to the center aisle, in this dark noisy metal tube attached to four turbofan engines hurtling through the great unknowns (the southeastern US) on the way to Florida. I did what any engineering troop does in such a situation: I got bored, stretched out on an empty length of web seating, and went to sleep.
You know how when an airliner gets close to the ground, typically for a landing, and you can hear the sound of the engines echoing off the pavement? Yeah. I heard that, but couldn’t see anything through the nonexistant windows, and had no idea how long I had just blinked for. I distinctly thinking “We’re gonna crash!!” before I heard the tires touch down under us.
Sheepishly, I sat up and wiped the drool off my face, thankful that for once I hadn’t spoken what I was thinking about at that given moment.:smack:
Hey, I almost drowned in the New too! /high five
My friends and I were out in the middle sitting on some rocks that were easy to wade to - unless they opened the dam. Which they did. We were cut off from shore in the fast moving current. One of my friends had the bright idea to float down to the bend in the river where we could wade ashore. “It’s not that far.”
Except there were two rapids we couldn’t see and the water was like 50 degrees (someone had been pulled out earlier with hypothermia) and it was farther than it looked.
My friends somehow got swept in close to shore, but I got pushed out and I couldn’t swim any more. I had sneakers on that felt like lead weights and I was freezing. I remember floating on my back just trying to stay up and thinking, “this is it.” I was so cold and I felt like I needed to go to sleep. I would close my eyes for a few seconds until I started sinking, and then I would wake up and flail until I was floating again.
And then I saw a kayaker. It was all I could do to turn over and wave. He pulled me to shore, and I staggered the 1/4 mile back to the car trying to get my core temp back up. I know if he hadn’t been there I would have drown. I love that kayaker, wherever he is.
I never went down to the New again.
Creek in the woods, sunny 36F winter day of my 36th year-- the ice had broken up recently and there were big chunks about ten inches thick and three to five feet across floating around. My friend on her tall thoroughbred horse crossed the creek first and about five feet out he spooked and made a giant leap, landing in the middle of the creek and then leaping again to the opposite bank. She managed to hang on and get him stopped even though he tried to run off.
My faithful quarter horse started walking down into the creek and and strangely enough it seemed deeper than usual. He carefully kept walking as the water came higher and higher up on him until it began to wash over his withers. Suddenly he stumbled (apparently on a chunk of ice that was dug into the river bottom, causing the bank to wash out) and went completely under. I rolled off over his shoulder and bobbed along under the water, not knowing which way was up. It got oddly quiet except for the bubbly rush of the stream through the vents in my riding helmet. Again, that calm voice in my head, “I wonder how far downstream they will find my body.” But I managed to find my feet and stand up in waist high freezing cold water, gasping for air, and my friend caught my horse as he lunged up the far bank.
Okay, so I didn’t drown but now I had to get back to the barn a mile or so away. My friend had to convince me to leave the creek as I seemed content just to stand there and try to breathe. I staggered out and right past her, apparently having decided I would walk back. She convinced me to get back on my horse which turned into a bit of a challenge as my coveralls were so completely waterlogged the crotch was nearly to my ankles. She put my trusty steed in the ditch beside the trail (an old railroad roadbed), got on her horse and somehow managed to grab on to my clothes and muscle me into the saddle.
We turned and galloped side by side for home, she even managing to give me her gloves on the way and being mock-offended when I complained about the holes in them. By the time we got back my coveralls were frozen but my horse was nearly dry. I blanketed him up and and borrowed some dry clothes and neither of us were the worse for wear.
August 25, 1969 Vietnam.
We were trying to get to some guys that were pinned down. I followed two guys who, one at a time, ran out to a paddy dike some fifty feet away. We were to go out there and try to put out enough fire to so we could get the men out of there. The first two ran out and started firing. When I started I got about half way when I tripped on a big dirt clog (the field had been plowed but never smothed out). As I was hitting the ground I heard them open up. Another second upright and I’d have been shot for sure.
There were at least 5-6 times when men within arms reach of me were shot.
1972/3 rock climbing at Seneca Rocks, WV. Due to not being familiar with the routes there I found myself leading a route that was WAY over my head. It was maybe a hundred foot climb and after the first twenty feet I knew I was in trouble. There was never a point where I thought if I fell I wouldn’t go all the way to the ground. I don’t think I’ve ever been so scared in my life.
A continuence from my previous post.
In November 1969 I had a dream that we were in a firefight. I was standing behind a large tree. I’d lean around and fire off a magazine, then reload and do it again.
While reloading, and having turned so I was looking backwards from the action, I saw an NVA step out around a tree. We saw each other at the same time. I’m pushing the magazine home while watching him bring his rifle up toward me. As I was trying to bring my rifle down on him I saw him fire and could see the rounds leave his rifle. I looked down to watch three bullets hit me in the chest. I could see the dust fly off my flackjacket as they hit and clearly remember thinging, “I’m a dead man.” Then I woke up.
For the rest of my tour, about three months, I never really believed I’d get home alive.
I remember the helicopter ride from LZ Baldy, 25ish miles south of Danang, to Danang just thinking over and over, “I made it.”
When I was eight something I’m not going to go into happened (at least not until the responsible person dies), and I had not at all unrealistic fears that I wasn’t going to be able to keep myself and my then two-year-old brother from being killed. Forunately it worked out. It’s the only time in my life I ever was so scared that my memory has a hole in it, a missing chunk of time then picking up at the end only after the police found us.
I’ve had a few somewhat close calls, mostly swimming alone in lake Michigan in choppy waves - but those don’t compare to any of the posts above, especially the combat ones. (much love to all you vets!)
The incident that had me really convinced I was going to die was when I was held up at gunpoint by a guy that looked like he shot people for the sheer fun of it. After I had given him all my cash, he told me to turn around and walk slowly away. I did, listening for his footsteps or the sound of a gunshot. After 10 seconds that seemed like 10 hours, I peeked over my shoulder and saw he was gone. I had recurring visions of him pressing the gun against my stomach for weeks after that. Fucker.
This thread is an excellent reminder of how fragile our lives are, and how we really need to cherish every second. I don’t post alot at all, but I’ve lurked here since about 2000, and I think you guys are really, really great. I just wanted you all to know I appreciate you.
I thought that I was going to die once while camping at Yosemite National Park when I was a teenager. I had fallen asleep in some tall grass watching a comet shower, and it was sounds from kicking blows, fists pounding, and pleading, muffled screams that woke me.
Several men had robbed someone, and were beating the living daylights out of him just a few feet away from me, and the the attackers were raging desperately about getting enough money for a fix.
I felt my body go into a panic mode: shaking, sweating, and hyperventilating out of control, when somehow I forced my mind to accept that my own death was a real possibility; and for some reason this awareness allowed me to relax and remain quietly hidden in the grass until the men left.
I got up when I felt it was safe and ran as fast as I could to the ranger station to report the incident, and get help for the victim. But I will never forget that feeling of calm that came over me when I was so afraid, because any sound or movement on my part would have put me into more danger by alerting the junkies to my presence.
It was a big lesson for me, who by nature is a person of action, yet learning that it was by non action I probably survived in that situation.
Twice.
One time my car started doing circles on the road when I was going about 55. It was winter and went into the ditch. If I hadn’t hit at exactly 180 degrees I don’t think I would be around.
Second time…and this is weird…I was treking south of Chico Mountana with a friend. I hear him say ‘oh shit’ or something and take off. I look around and a bison was bearing down at us. I took off but tripped, realized I wasn’t going to get away and proceeded to play ‘ring around the rosy’ with the bison with a tree inbeween. The bison was so nimble I actually had to grab the trunk of the tree to help me swing around it to keep it between it and me.
Yup, I was actually thinking…“this is it!”.
When I was 14 a buddy of mine showed me this antique rabbit ear shotgun in his grandmas closet. He showed me how the extended “ears” made cocking it easier. Then he pointed it at my face and pulled both triggers. Naturally I was pissed and told him what a dumbass he was. He began to show me it wasn’t loaded and then looked at me stunned. It was loaded. Both barrels.
“Sure, sure,” I told him,“you put a couple of empties in to freak me out.” He pulled them out and handed them to me. They were a couple of old paper shell Federals full and heavy with lead. The brass caps were both dimpled where the hammers had hit. He saw in my eyes what I was going to do and got up to run but I managed to bean both of them off his head before he could make it out of the room. He dodged me for about a week till I cooled down.
Even with old shells the odds both would misfire has to be way up there. I don’t know why I’m still alive. I should have cured cancer or something by now.
I want to thank you too SandyHook. I was a kid then but I have a brother who was a marine in nam. I worried about him a lot and prayed more then than I ever have since. When he got out he didn’t talk a lot about it. It was over and done and he didn’t want to go back even in memory for a long time. I’m sure there were a lot of scary times but he never said.
One story he told I guess because it was funny in a way was of breakfast one morning. He had just sat down to eat when this guy comes in from ranging with his clothes rotting off and props his rifle up and digs in like he hasn’t eaten in forever. About then a round hits the ground near him but he keeps eating like crazy as everyone else dives in the dirt trying to locate where it came from. Obviously he had brought a Vietnamese friend back with him. Another round strikes nearer but the guy keeps eating. Finally a round knocks the plate from his hand and he looks down at it defeated. He must have been paying some attention though because he picked up his rifle and fired at a tree along the jungle border and a sniper fell out. He then piled his plate again and went right back to eating.
GAWD, my story is so BORING!
About three years ago, Hubster and I flew to a friend’s house where we visited and also dog-sat for four weeks. On the flight there–or at the airport–I must have picked up what I call the “Alien Mutant Respiratory Virus.” I coughed and hacked and choked for the entire visit. I felt like I had one foot in the grave on the flight home.
I saw our family doctor soon after our return, and my wheezing was loud enough to hear by others as I walked down the hall.
Long boring story short–FIVE courses of antibiotics, prescription inhalers, cough syrup, and I had asthma. The antibiotics would work, but as soon as they were finished, the green glop returned.
Even EATING made my chest hurt.
I remember sitting up until 3 AM, thinking I had to STAY AWAKE so I could consciously inhale the air into my chest. I was afraid if I went to sleep, I’d die.
I still have asthma. It flares up occasionally, but NOTHING like what I had three years ago.
And I’m never gonna fly again.
~VOW
When I worked in Kazakhstan, pretty much any plane ride on Aeroflot had the potential to have a near death experience. On one flight, the co-pilot announced that there was a leak in the hydraulic line and asked that passengers provide the flight attendants with any liquids, presumably to maintain pressure. After a rapid and bumpy descent we landed on a old WWII strip and waited three hours for a fleet of trucks to get us to a train station. We finally got to our camp two days later.
Needless to say, the Aeroflot charter contract was canceled pretty quickly… 