Homes Flattened In Salford Gas Explosion
November 02, 2010
Not one fatality... amazing really
Lucky B*stard
Miracle escape after toddler falls seven storeys from apartment block, bounces off café awning and is CAUGHT by passerby
3rd November 2010
The boy's fortunes were even more miraculous than it first appeared. According to reports, the cafe, in the north-eastern part of the city, had been closed for the All Saints bank holiday on Monday, an occasion that would usually see the awning closed. However there was a jam in the mechanism which meant it had been left out from the day before.
A man living in a building opposite from the apartment told France Info he saw the toddler playing by the window with a girl a few years older. The doctor who caught the boy, named by French press as Philippe Benseniot, was walking by with his wife and son when the boy spotted him falling. He said: 'I was there at the right time. My son happened to look up and he saw that a little boy was on the balcony and had somehow got through the railing and was playing on the very edge of a vertical drop into the street. I just had the time to get across the street and place myself. I said to myself: "whatever happens, I mustn't miss him". 'He didn't have a scratch. He cried for a few moments and then calmed down and fell asleep.'
Neighbours on the seventh floor then prevented the little boy's sister from falling after him after speaking with her through the locked front door. 'I said, "Where is your brother?" and she said: "He's fallen",' said witness Samia Benmoussa. 'I panicked until I discovered what had happened. It was a real miracle.'
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Family covered in 25 litres of white paint after crashing car
Four family members had a lucky escape after crashing into another car - but they did end up being smothered in almost 25 litres of white emulsion paint.
The shocked family emerges from the crash (Picture: SWNS) The shocked family emerges from the crash (Picture: SWNS)
The family and the driver of the other car - which, fortunately, was already painted white - were not hurt. However, it is thought that their blue Fiat car, which had its bonnet crumpled by the crash, is likely to be a white off.
The family were said to be overcome with emulsion.
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Man shot in head sneezes out bullet
Gunshot victim Darco Sangermano stunned doctors by sneezing out a bullet that had hit him in the head.
Mr Sangermano was hit by the stray bullet as revellers fired into the air on New Year’s Eve. The .22-calibre round entered the right side of his head, passed behind his eye, hit a bone in his nose and finally lodged in his nostril, before being sneezed out in hospital. The incident happened in Naples, Italy, where two other people were hit and one was killed in similar incidents.
Mr Sangermano’s girlfriend, of Turin, who asked not to be named, said: ‘We were walking when all of a sudden there were some bangs and he said he felt a pain to his head – he was covered in blood.’
Factory worker survives being dragged through five-inch gap in machinery that broke his back, pelvis, arm, hips and ribs
24 March 2011
He was so badly hurt in the accident that his partner was told to 'expect the worst' when she arrived at the hospital where he was taken. But two years after the near-death experience, Matthew's only visible sign of injury is a weakened right arm. Yesterday, Matthew, from Birdwell, Barnsley, South Yorkshire, said: 'I still don't know how I didn't die. As the machine dragged me through I just relaxed because I knew I couldn't do anything and I thought that was the end for me.'
Astonishingly, the machine dragged him all the way through, before depositing him on the floor with his clothes in tatters.
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I'm sure he didn't feel too lucky at the time, but that's some story...
Last edited by faceless on Sun May 04, 2014 2:40 am, edited 1 time in total.
Deep Sleep: Hole Nearly Swallows Gran's Bed
July 22, 2011
Sky News
Mrs Hernandez was startled by a large booming sound which she thought was a gas explosion outside. The sound was actually the earth under her bed imploding to create a deep and almost perfectly circular hole. If the pit had been a few metres larger it may have swallowed the pensioner as she slept.
The 65-year-old said: "My son was crying because you never expect something like that in the bedroom. When they raised the bed and I stood by this big hole my son then said that we have to call the firefighters because they need to come. Thanks to God and the holy Mary that nothing bad happened, it was an accident."
In the weeks before the pit appeared neighbours had reported hearing strange sounds coming from the earth and now fear further implosions. Guatemala's national disaster relief agency have come to Mrs Hernandez's home to investigate the sinkhole and determine if there are any risks to residents in the area.
Investigator David De Leon said: "The whole city rests on volcanic material which means that some areas are not stable." Sinkholes, formed by the natural process of erosion, can be gradual but are often sudden. Guatemala City is especially prone to them.
Amazing survival of 50mph motorcyclist knocked out by low-flying pigeon… whose bike then accelerated to 140mph while he was UNCONSCIOUS
1st September 2011
Matthew Brealy, 38, collapsed when the bird smashed through his helmet visor and shattered his glasses as he drove along a stretch of road. But he remained on the powerful 1,000 cc Suzuki GSXR which was sent hurtling a further 200 yards before it ploughed into an oak tree. The bike disintegrated on impact.
Mr Brealy, from Whittington Moor, in Chesterfield, suffered two skull fractures with bleeding to his brain, a broken leg, cracked ribs and a fractured hand following the crash in April. He spent ten weeks in Sheffield's Northern General Hospital where his hand was re-wired and a titanium rod was inserted in his leg. The veteran biker, who runs an electrical business, is now learning to walk again with help from his pregnant wife Emma.
He had been out with a friend and was travelling at around 50 mph on a road between Caenby Corner and Retford, in Nottinghamshire, when he was struck by the bird. ‘It smashed through my helmet visor and even smashed the lens of my glasses,' he said. 'I was doing about 50 mph at the time and the impact knocked me unconscious. It appears that I collapsed on the front of my bike and at the same time I hit the throttle so the bike just accelerated out of control. Police told me afterwards they estimated that the bike had gone from 50 mph to around 140 mph in a matter of seconds but thankfully for me it happened on a straight road which is why I probably didn't fall off the machine.
‘My bike hit an oak tree with a glancing blow, I was thrown clear and the machine was smashed to pieces under the impact. Police confirmed a pigeon was the cause of the accident. My visor was left with a hole in it and I was covered in pigeon blood and feathers.’
A farmer who came across the wreckage blocked the road with his combined harvester and paramedics treated the injured motorcyclist by the roadside for an hour before he was taken to hospital by air ambulance.
‘There's no doubt it was a bizarre, freak accident and I am aware that I am lucky to be arrive,’ he added. ‘I am 99 per cent back to normal but I have had to learn to walk again but with the support of my wife Emma, my family I was determined to get on my feet again and back to work.’
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Amazing escape for mother and daughter after lorry carrying 3,000 chickens flips over and crushes their car
20th September 2011
The daughter had been driving on the inside lane when she noticed the lorry, carrying a load of 3,000 chickens, start to wobble. She grabbed her mother and pulled her down just as the vehicle hit them. They were inside, curled up together, when the emergency services arrived.
Traffic sergeant Andy Quigley was one of the first on the scene at the A64 in York on Monday. He described it as the most incredible escape he had seen in 16 years as a traffic policeman. ‘They are very lucky indeed,’ he said. ‘When we got the call that a lorry had overturned on a car, we fully anticipated we would be dealing with a fatal accident.’ Both women and the driver of the lorry were taken to hospital where they were treated for cuts, bruises and shock.
Efforts to clear the scene of wreckage were hampered because the lorry was carrying thousands of chickens, some of which lay dead and dying on the road and verge, and in cages still on the vehicle. RSPCA officers were called to assist in dealing with the birds.
It is not known why the lorry toppled over.
Miracle of woman who had a LIVE grenade lodged in her face - and survived... after brave doctors cut it out
Leon Watson
28th September 2011
It all started one day when the mother-of-three, from Culiacán, in the state of Sinaloa, was selling seafood on the street. She heard a bang and something hit, knocking her down. Karla felt a burning sensation in her face and when she raised her hand to it there was blood. Then she lost consciousness.
When Karla woke up in Culiacán General Hospital she thought a stone or rock must have got lodged in her face. The 32-year-old said: 'The doctor asked me what happened. I told him that I thought a stone hit me. Then they started to look and discovered that it was some kind of projectile, but they didn't know what it was.'
The x-ray and the tomography showed a weird object stuck between the superior and inferior jawbones. Then they realised - it wasn't a stone, it was a live grenade. Apparently, the grenade was fired with a grenade launcher - the noise that Karla heard - but it didn't explode when it hit her face. It just got embedded.
Immediately the hospital was put on alert - because the deadly explosive could go off at any moment and kill everyone within 32ft. Barely able to breathe, Karla was isolated and the hospital's patients and staff evacuated. But the clock was ticking and something still had to be done with Karla. Most of the doctors didn't want to operate her.
Finally, the hospital head, Dr Gaxiola Meza, asked for volunteers. Four brave people came forward: Two anesthesiologists, Felipe Ortiz y Cristina Soto, the nurse Rodrigo Arredondo and Dr Lidia Soto. Along with two explosive experts from the Mexican army, they took Karla to an open field to operate on her.
They took all the surgical equipment with them, including light sources. That way, in case they made a mistake, nobody else would die. Karla, under only local anesthesia, was given a tracheotomy so she could breathe and four hours later, around midnight, it was done. The device was extracted from her head by a doctor wearing no armour and guided by military experts.
The patient lost half of her teeth, her face is deformed by the giant scar and, according to the doctors, she has at least three years of operations ahead. But she is alive.
Police are investigating but no arrests have been made.