The Grim Reaper will eventually come for each of us. We just don’t know when… And while we often measure our lives in years, sometimes it takes a single step, a wrong decision, or mere seconds to end it all. One moment, you’re going about your day as per usual. The next, you’re convinced that you’re inhaling your final breaths.
Someone asked, “What was your scariest ‘A second later and I would’ve [passed away]’ moment?” and many of the responses read like a suspenseful thriller. Among them: the person who narrowly avoided being swept up in the 2004 Thailand tsunami, and the lucky one who could have been in an elevator when it suddenly plummeted two floors down.
Bored Panda has put together a list of the most gripping survivor stories for you to scroll through when you need a reminder to live each moment as if it’s your last. Don’t forget to upvote your favorites, and feel free to share your own close calls in the comments section below.
#1
Outside my college dorm my freshman year there was this “stoop” that was half under the building, half out from under it. The building was 18 stories tall.
So I’m sitting out there sitting on the steps (not under the building) and I get up for no real reason and walk under the building. As soon as I get under the building, a huge sheet of glass falls right where I was sitting. Some idiots where messing around on the 11th floor and knocked a 10×9 window pane out of its mooring.
Image source: ethanlan, magnific
#2
On 16th December 2004 I was with a friend having a beer in a bar on the Koh san Rd in Bangkok, Thailand. It was the last week of my bumming round the world and we had a decision to make.
Do we go home for Christmas or spend it on the beach in Phuket. Neither of us had been to Phuket and we thought it would be an awesome end to living out of a back pack for the last 18 months but on the other hand Christmas at home with the family was also appealing.
So we flipped a coin and went home to the UK.
Flipping that coin a second earlier or later could have sent us into the path of the 2004 Boxing Day Tsunami.
Image source: Booms777, David Rydevik
#3
My friend and I were taking an elevator down to the cafeteria in our dorm in college. For some reason, we were arguing about something when the doors opened, so we hung back for a second.
Then the elevator dropped two floors with the doors open.
I still hate getting in/out of elevators and I do a weird running start every time.
Edit: happened in Canada, was an old building/elevator.
Image source: kimb0q, Leon Seibert
#4
My dad and I were driving down the road after heavy rainfall in Vermont. He is driving, and I am fiddling with the radio. I hear a very load CRACK, and before I can ask my dad what it was, out of the corner of my eye I see movement.
An entire tree was falling on the road – due to the heavy rainfall, the dirt was too wet to keep some trees in place.
My dad stood on his brake, cartoon style, and we slid nearly right into the tree. I heard a pop before we fully stopped, and when we lurched back to 0mph, we were both breathing hard. My dad got out to check the damage, and the pop I hear was a branch hitting a headlight out.
First time I’ve ever seen my dad call 911. It was scary. Could have been the end of us if he didn’t stop to chat to the waitress after we left the restaurant to go home.
Image source: fruchte, Markus Winkler
#5
Once I almost stepped on a scorpion fish, that was a close call believe me. It was in no more than 3 feet of water in plain sand, so be careful everyone.
Image source: Shure_Lock, Wai Siew
#6
While my family & I were hiking in a national park in the mountains of North Carolina, we stopped beside a small stream close to the top of a waterfall for lunch. I decided to walk down closer to the waterfall for a better look.
All of a sudden, bees. Multiple bees, and me terrified of them.
I start doing what anyone at my age with no survival skills and a fear of bees would: closing my eyes, shrieking, flailing around & running in circles. Right by the edge of the waterfall.
My family came to pull me out & back up the ledge. They said I came close to falling. I ended up with just a couple stings. Bees & I now keep a healthy distance.
Image source: lost_cule, Proinsias Mac an Bheatha
#7
I was about 9 or 10, and riding a horse for the first time on a trail ride. My horse suddenly pricked its ears and went a little faster, and a tree fell across the trail directly behind us.
Image source: coastal_vocals, prostooleh
#8
This is a sweet memory: My girlfriend at the time and I were walking on a semi-rural road in Santa Cruz County around 1993 or so. We stopped for a second and kissed. In that moment a car went careening off the road just a few feet in front of us. Had we not stopped for that kiss we would have been directly in its path.
Image source: yenrab23, oscar_m
#9
Was hiking on an unofficial trail with some friends when we decided to climb up a rather steep dirt hill to look for a new path. Being the heaviest, I was on the bottom as my buds climbed up above me. The dirt was pretty loose and sometimes would slip underneath us. The drop was pretty decent, the bottom being a ravine covered in plants such that we couldn’t actually see what was there, just hear the water. Anyway, as the lightest of our group climbed further up to search for possible paths, every pebble he kicked down would knock over progressively bigger rocks until I saw one the size of my backpack plummeting toward me. I wasn’t really scared by it, my mind just registered, “Hey, I should probably move right about now.” I transitioned to another rock foothold and the second I turned around I saw the rock fly past the spot where my backpack had just been. Had I turned a second later the rock would’ve slammed into my backpack and launched me into the ravine. We decided to search for a new path elsewhere.
Image source: anon, user21829937
#10
I was caught in a Rip Tide in the Caribbean. All my friends were on shore. I was waving back to shore to try and signal help & my friends were waving back. I was paddling so hard against the current panicking I could feel my body giving up with exhaustion. The danger was I had never heard of a rip tide or how to deal with it. The beach was also littered with no swimming signs but a local guide said it was fine. Thankfully one of my friends decided to play catch waist high in the sea with another friend and got close enough to hear me struggle. Told me to swim sideways, I was seconds away from giving up. When I finally got to shore I collapsed from exhaustion and lay on the sand thanking my lucky stars.
Image source: NineteenEighty7even, ErikGlez
#11
When I was in middle school I called my mom on my cell during lunch because my head hurt so badly I couldn’t move (she was 1 on speed dial). Well the nurse came and brought me to the office for a check up and some pain pills while I waited for my mom (we didn’t live close).
Nurse said no fever, and to take me home and put me to bed. My mom watched me get into the truck and decided that maybe we should go to the hospital to be safe. By the time we reached the hospital (it was further then our home) my temp was at 104 and I was incapacitated.
I had meningitis. If we went home and she put me to bed like the nurse suggested, I never would have woken up.
Edit for detail: For those who keep asking/speculating it was Viral Meningitis (the less severe form) but it progressed very quickly. I had no headache when I arrived at school. By lunch time I couldn’t move on my own and I couldn’t see because light was too bright. The nurse came to get me and I didn’t have a fever. After waiting for my mom 10 minutes and the 20 minute drive to the hospital and 10 minute wait at the hospital it was at 104.
Yes we told the nurse after, but there was only some of the symptoms when I left school. She never gave me or my mother advice again, just told symptoms and gave pain meds.
Image source: elephantlover95, hryshchyshen
#12
I was walking into a Miller’s Outpost (tells you the time period) and the ‘M’ from the sign above the store fell down and hit me on the shoulder. It was a big glass sign. One moment sooner and it hits my head. Because it drew blood, the store offered to give me any item I wanted so I wouldn’t sue. I chose an awful red cardigan. I was 16 and dumb.
Image source: Acridid12, aksakalko
#13
When I was about 9 or 10, I was in the basement helping my grandma do laundry. She had a big braided rug on the floor and I was bouncing all over the place. I was wearing socks and jumping on and off the rug.
She bends over to get something out of the drier and reaches across the rug to grab something. I realize what she’s reaching for is a snake, just inches between the two of us. I yell at her to STOP, we both scream and the snake quickly takes on an aggressive posture.
I run outside and grab a broom and my grandma starts beating the poor thing with it. Grandpa hears the commotion and rushes downstairs and delivers the last blow. Turns out that little nope noodle that snuck into the house was a venomous copperhead.
Image source: mamabeariguess, wombatzaa
#14
I was freshman in college and came back to my hometown for fall break. I decided to go to a football game to hang out with some old friends. On the way home, I stopped at a red light and when it turned green, I pulled forward, as usual.
From the left, a truck suddenly hit me. He was speeding and ran the red light, t-boned me right in front of my driver’s door. I luckily got out with just an injured knee and fractured clavicle and some bruising.
It haunted me for a while that, had I pulled forward just a little faster or he had been just a quarter second slower he would’ve gone straight into my driver’s door and I likely wouldn’t have made it.
He wasn’t even drunk or under the influence, it was just a 16-year-old kid not paying attention.
Image source: HopelessDreamerDM, podyukoleg
#15
I was swimming with my dad and my younger brother in a lake. We had one of those decent sized blow up rafts that we brought out to play around on.
I thought it was cool to swim underneath the raft and surface on the other side. Well the third time I tried this my little brother jumped into the raft and his body slammed into my head while I was swimming underneath, completely disorienting me.
I remember just inhaling tons of water and trying to figure out which way was up and every time I tried surfacing I’d hit the bottom of the raft and become disoriented again. I could feel myself starting to black out before I pulled myself up around the side of the raft.
No one even knew anything was wrong until I started heaving up water and coughing.
Similar to this when I was around 8 I didn’t know how to swim very well and was at my grandmother’s neighbors home playing in thejr pool with a friend my age. Accidentally stepped out of the shallow end and slid into the deep end and remember just sitting at the bottom staring up at the surface and starting to black out. Friend’s mother dove in and saved me.
Still love water though. 10/10 would swim under blow up raft again.
#16
I briefly looked at my phone to skip a song on Spotify and barely missed walking right in front of a my neighbor’s truck. I didn’t notice at the time, and was actually told by said neighbor the next day. It’s a weird feeling knowing that you were completely oblivious to almost being gone.
Image source: colby_adler02, prostooleh
#17
Not me, but my dad decided to stay for one more drink at a bar after work back in 1989. if he left before that last drink, he would have been on the old Bay Bridge, very close if not under the section that collapsed, during the 1989 Loma Prietta earthquake.
Image source: Cal1V1k1ng, Ambreen
#18
Not really a time thing as much as a distance thing. I was at a car festival (BMW e30 fest) and this modified BMW e30 with a 4.4 supercharged V8(400 hp-ish) was doing a burnout in 3rd gear, so the wheels were spinning, probably at like 80mph, something like that.
Anyway, the car moved a bit forward and I just hear “whoosh **PTING**” and this walnut sized rock just flew straight past my ear. My best friend and I just locked eyes and went “Whoah” and then continued watching.
I just don’t want to know what a walnut sized rock does to a human head when it’s traveling 80 mph.
Later we got drunk and watched flames shoot from exhausts. Was fun.
Image source: brtrobs, Getty Images
#19
I was like 6 or 7 when my dad and i were driving to his parents summer cabin. Suddenly, a huge moose runs from the forest, from our right, and across the road.
I mean, there’s no small moose, let’s get that straight. But this was out of this world *huuuuuge*. And we avoided hitting it by literally just a second. It was *so* close that i’m sure we would’ve hit it if either we or the moose gained a second somewhere, we would’ve been gone for sure. Hitting a moose with car is almost surely an end sentence anyway but that thing was just so extra large that there would’ve been no chance.
Image source: Pm_me_thigh_boots, Gabe Pierce
#20
Climbed out on a thin rocky ledge…mixture of dirt and rock. I’m way above tree tops. Slip on some moss, dig my fingers in to the dirt and somehow do not fall. I climbed back across the ledge and back up two rock overhangs faster than I’ve ever climbed anything in my life. My friend was amazed he said I looked like a monkey climbing outta that situation….
#21
When I was learning to skydive I was trying to complete a level that involved turning 360 degrees clockwise and anti-clockwise in the air. First two attempts I could turn clockwise but not the other way for some reason.
Cue the third attempt jump and again clockwise goes like clockwork (if you’ll pardon the pun) and so I try and turn anti-clockwise, but instead of going that direction or just not turning (like I had previously), I began to spin clockwise faster and faster and faster. I eventually span up to what I worked out to be ~200rpm pulling about 15G. I could feel myself blacking out and my arms being forced outwards, but instead of pulling when I started spinning like I was supposed to I kept fighting it and making it worse and instead looked at my altitude and pulled when I would have done normally.
Had I kept going and not pulled and blacked out I could definitely have been gone from being tangled in my reserve. The spinning also caused all the capillaries in my eyes to burst and so I looked like the devil for two weeks.
Image source: DirtyNorf, Kamil Pietrzak
#22
Driving behind a pickup truck on the LA freeway with a massive load of furniture piled in the bed. Just as I am pulling up to this thing to get around it all the furniture comes flying out the back. I had to swerve, going full freeway speeds, multiple lanes to avoid hitting anything. Somehow I managed to avoid everything and maintain control of my car. My adrenaline was pounding the hardest I had ever felt. I didn’t even think to look back and see what happened behind me.
That same day, late at night on a desert road (was on a long road trip)… I was booking and *again* had to swerve, but this time around a giant black dog straight up just standing in the middle of the road. We are talking waaaaaay out in the middle of nowhere. Just this massive black shaggy dog standing there. Didn’t even look up at the car as I barely got around it. Here’s the craziest part of this… a handful of miles down the road I had to stop at this tiny little rickety single pump gas station. Super old and run down but actually had a pump with a card slot. It’s like 2 am, there is one little flickering light above the pump. Pitch black everywhere around. I’m standing there pumping my gas. A cat walks into the light and passed me…. followed by a big massive shaggy black dog. I had probably pumped 2 gallons, I got right back in my car and bounced out of there.
#23
In 2015 I was planning to go to Paris with my friends. We lived in NL at the time and planned to take the afternoon bus, and then be there for dinner. But then, we realised if we take the afternoon bus we would have to skip a class, so we decided to take the next available bus. Later that evening, the Paris attacks happened. The restaurant we planned to have dinner in was within the affected area. We were “trapped” as basically the country went into lockdown for a few days, but at least we didn’t get ourselves hurt or something.
Image source: oerangbandoeng, Norbu GYACHUNG
#24
I was working on a pipe crew in 1998, we were installing a large concrete vault in a pretty big hole. I’m standing in a ditch about six feet deep marking grade while the excavator operator is digging. So to the front of me is a large excavator bucket, itself weighing hundreds of pounds and backed by powerful hydraulics and thousands of pounds of steel armature, and behind me is a solid concrete wall about a foot thick. And the ditch is only a few feet wide and too tall for me to jump or climb out of with any kind of speed.
Suddenly the excavator spins to one side and the arm snaps out to full extension with full force, and the operator shuts it down. The bucket missed my head by about a foot. He climbs out of the machine, visibly shaken, and tells me that something has failed on the machine and the arm “wasn’t supposed to have done that.” So as he’s been digging he’s been noticing that ever so slightly there’s a bit of a delay between his inputs and the machine’s actions, and in the moment before failure he just felt “something wasn’t right” and tried to pull the bucket in; when it didn’t seem to want to, he turned the excavator “just in case” and that’s when the arm extended. Had he not, I would have been crushed.
There were two other excavator operators on that crew, and they were basically idiots. Had one of them been with us that day, I’m sure I’d be gone.
Image source: luckygiraffe, user user
#25
A couple months ago I was in a head on collision with some dude driving down the wrong side of the road with his headlights out. I was going probably around 50 before I saw him (speed limit was 55 so that’s my best guess.) saw him with a second or two of reaction time, managed to brake hard and swerve over only bad enough to total my car, but I still walked away with nothing more than a sore neck. If I hadn’t seen the dude I don’t doubt that I could’ve passed away or been seriously injured.
Image source: nicksg983, Scott Greer
#26
I don’t know if I would’ve been gone, but when I was very small I woke up in the middle of the night with a feeling like the dog was missing. I woke up everyone in the house and we went looking for the dog. Somehow we were all outside when a Molotov cocktail was thrown into the neighbor’s house and their house exploded setting only one room in our house on fire—mine and my sister’s. If I hadn’t had everyone frantically searching for the dog, who knows what would’ve happened. The dog must have known something was up, too because she had gotten out of the house and was hiding under a porch across the street.
Image source: redsetded, Jen Theodore
#27
Had a bad hangover and was kind of nervous/jittery, which in turn made me extra watchful. I was driving home, light turned green and I started to go. Car going about 45 in crowded city traffic doesn’t care and goes right through the red. I slammed on the brakes and felt my anti-lock brakes engage for the first time in I don’t know how long. Guy missed me by inches. Didn’t even slow down.
Had I not been hungover I doubt I would have given the cross traffic that second look to see him barreling toward me. He likely would have t-boned me right in the driver’s door.
Image source: billbixbyakahulk, Getty Images
#28
A friend asked for a ride on my motorcycle so I let him wear the spare helmet and took him for seafood at Neptune’s Net in Malibu. Some of the nearby beach houses have driveways that lead directly onto the highway. So while we were on the return trip back toward Santa Monica an SUV pulls onto my lane.
There was absolutely no time to brake.
As a precaution against this kind of thing I always watch the wheels of parked vehicles for movement and I always rest a thumb on the horn. So I see trouble brewing, honk as soon as the other vehicle starts to move, and change lanes.
The driver of that SUV neither saw me coming nor responded to the horn. The only reason we didn’t have a t-bone collision was because of that lane change. I skirted around it with about a foot and a half to spare.
It wasn’t the closest call I’ve ever had but it was the onlyone where I was responsible for another person. I would have known to leap off the seat just before impact but the passenger wouldn’t. It turned out later he didn’t even realize we’d nearly been in an accident–probably because his head was turned to enjoy the ocean view.
The laws of physics made that swerve especially difficult because I’m a slender woman; the passenger weighed forty pounds more than me.
Image source: doublestitch, katemangostar
#29
I crossed the road behind a tram not seeing the track beside it going the other direction the oncoming tram missed me by inches.
Image source: creamywhip, pvproductions
#30
Literally last week I was crossing the street with my sister and we saw this huge lifted truck with a big trailer connected with a tractor on the back. He was stopped and checking his left for a few seconds and we were waiting and finally decided to start walking, but the second we started walking he slammed on his gas and turned right and never once looked in our direction. If we had started walking 1 second sooner we would’ve been flat.
#31
Was pulling out of the driveway when I realized I left my phone in the kitchen, so I went in to grab it. on my way there was a terrible car accident two cars in front of me, definitely would have been me if I hadnt left my phone.
Image source: poeticpathetic
#32
Driving on a country road at night with a mate who just got his license, anyways doing 80km/h and all the lights went out, it was nearly pitch black and he slams on the brakes, car stops, lights come back on and we were greeted with a “sharp bend” sign and a sheer cliff 50m further on down the road with a 30m drop off into the ocean.
Hell, that was scary and a tense ride home.
Image source: RaptureRising
#33
I used to work on a farm for a doctor that had antelopes on the property and one of my jobs was to feed them, my third day on the job was my first time actually doing it since my coworkers did it before. I went out there with the feed and started to pour it out so that they could eat, my supervisor shouts from the other side of the fence not to turn my back to the male antelope and I couldn’t hear him so the first thing I did was turn my back on the male antelope to ask my supervisor what he said, almost immediately I’d realized what I had done and turned back around to see the antelope about to skewer me. I jumped out of the way and he ripped the shirt off of my back.
Image source: yagarran
#34
The other month while I was walking the dog (Dobby, Cockapoo, cute as hell) I collapsed and ended up in the road
The only reason I didn’t get run over was a bus was stopping to let a dude off and he and the driver helped me get up and out of the road.
I spent a few days on the cardiac ward, I now have a heart monitor inserted into my chest, I’ve lost my driving licence and haven’t worked in three months.
Turns out I have low blood pressure that then occasionally plummets rather than any heart issues so now I’m on medication to up my BP. I should be able to go back to work next week and with the doctors help get my licence back.
It’s all been very emotional.
Image source: anon
#35
More like “another foot over”, but I was at work walking with some clients (3 kids around 8-9) and 2 other staff down the street. It was raining, and the roads were slick. This car coming our direction fast loses control on the wet pavement, skids in our direction onto the sidewalk we are walking on, slides about a foot past us (close enough to get our pant legs wet, but not our jackets, because the water never got high enough due to its launch point being so close to us), slammed into a tree behind us, bounced off the tree and kept driving several hundred yards down the road before the guy brought the car to a halt.
The driver was fine somehow, and none of us got hurt, but it was scary as hell and definitely had me thinking I could’ve died that day.
Image source: SubsequentlyPryor
#36
I was about 4 when I was playing a game of “slide under before the garage door closes.” At one point, I got stuck. This was before the safety features of these days. As i was stuck there with the door so heavy trying to crush my bones into dust, I knew I was about to be gone. The door was too relentless to even allow me to make noises.
Luckily, the postal worker was delivering and spotted me. She was able to alert the adults inside the house about me being trapped.
Image source: 50wpm
#37
I have numerous bad occasions with bikes , but a near-end experience really takes the cake. It was my dad, brother and I on a trail. We are riding downhill which then led to a sharp right turn. I am in front going fast and by the time i realized the degree of the turn it was too late. I did my best to slow down but at this point i knew it was too late . I knew this was it. I was going about 30-35 mph. Somehow, I managed to hit a tree right in the center when making the turn. If I was a few inches off to the left or right, I would have fell down a cliff.
Image source: Jesstheburrito
#38
Not me but my dad was supposed to be in the World Trade Center during 9/11. On the way there (we lived quite far away) he crashed with another car and broke his arm but the setback made him cancel his trip, if he didn’t get hit by the car…
Image source: TacticalGamer893
#39
I was traveling in Guatemala having a beer and food before crossing the Belize border. A local runs in yelling to the point we couldn’t understand. The bar tender yells leave! Dont pay! Run! Go back to Belize! (In a loud concerned, not angry voice) So we run to the border about a mile away, and it’s totally deserted with no one to stamp a passport. So we cross over looking back at the Guatemalan army heading to secure the border. There were a lot of people who passed away in that revolution. And we were foreigners in a border town where Americans were thought of as body snatchers who stole organs at the time.
Image source: pyrilampes
#40
Almost got decapitated by an unattended slackline while riding my bike through the park in the middle of my college. I saw it and ducked down a quarter second before it was too late.
I posted about it in my university’s subreddit recently, years later, and they turned it into a meme…
Image source: HorrorArm
#41
I passed out at work and came around in the hospital. They diagnosed a bleed on the brain and eventually decided to drill a hole in my skull to drain the fluid. Just as they were about to put me under, the phone rang. It was the Head of Neurology. I actually had a burst aneurysm. According to my doctor, I would have probably been gone seconds after they started the surgery.
Image source: fms10
#42
I did some volunteering abroad in a place that had a ton of feral street dogs. Usually they minded their own business and were easily scared away (I tended to carry a piece of rebar in my backpack for this purpose), but occasionally they would gang up and hurt people.
One night I got woken up by the sound of a bunch of them barking and howling; I wouldn’t have minded except I also heard the sound of a woman screaming. I ran out into the street to check it out, turned a corner and saw the biggest pack of them I’d ever seen – like, 30 dogs – all circling around this lady. I started yelling and throwing rocks thinking they’d scatter… which is when the whole pack immediately turned their attention towards me. They were coming at me with their teeth bared and their ears back and I remember being really intensely aware of the thought, *OK, I’m going to be gone right now…*
It was at that moment that a dude in a rickshaw came tearing down the road, flashing his lights and honking. This made the dogs bolt. Driver saved my life. It was a really great affirmation about how most people will do what they can to help you when you need it.
Image source: WeirdBeard92
#43
Went to a corner store for a drink, literally two minutes after I left someone robbed it and shot the cashier and another person in the store.
Edit: well this blew up.
Image source: Beccavexed
#44
I can not confirm whether this would have been the end however it would have changed my and my parents life like it. I was about 6 or 7 and I went along with my mum to go train the new puppy we had. The training ground was quite far away from home and I remember that it was a big field surrounded by a forest and a motorway on the side of it. I was told to stay in the car and play on my gameboy (back when they were a thing lol). After an hour or so I got bored and I went to have a look at where my mum was with our puppy. The carpark was a little while from the training ground but I decided to walk towards her anyway. In the meantime an older man (30ish) starts talking to me and the naive little boy I was I talked back (regardless of all the times my mum told me to NOT TALK TO STRANGERS). He convinced me I was going the wrong way and told me he would take me to my mum and puppy has. We ended up by the motorway side and we were about to walk down the bank to the side of the motorway where his car was parked. As I am about to disappear down the bank I hear the loudest scream of my name from my mum, I look back and feel the grip of the man tighten on my hand but I was just in time to get my hand out of his grip and run towards my mother. My mum runs past me to see where this guy is but he had just got into his car and drove off. To this day I still imagine about the what if scenario and how close I was to being kidnapped and potentially gone.
Image source: clipperlad
#45
My family and I were driving down the highway when we see a STOPPED SUV IN THE MIDDLE OF THE HIGHWAY WITH A FAMILY OF 6 INSIDE and the car in front of us didn’t get out of the way until the last second.
Image source: anon
#46
Basically I got t-boned by a van while riding my bicycle. Missed me by a couple inches, destroyed the back of the bike, and threw me into traffic.
Image source: anon
#47
My backpack got hit by a car while I was wearing it. Knocked me flat on my behind but I was okay.
Image source: viridian152
#48
A second doesn’t really apply to my story, but about an hour does. When I was in second grade my appendix swole up and burst. I had severe pain for weeks while the doctors tried to figure out what was wrong. After staying at the hospital for some time, they suddenly said they needed to operate. They had finally figured out what was wrong and had to basically clean out my insides. Since it had burst quite some time ago, I was in a pretty critical state. If they hadn’t realized soon after they did, I wouldn’t be here.
Image source: anon
#49
Back when I managed a clothing store, I had to walk from the mall to the bank every morning to drop off the deposit. To get to the bank I had to cross one street at a 4 way intersection. One day as I was making my way across, a van was in the middle of the intersection waiting to turn left and was patiently waiting as I had the right to cross the street. Some jerk in a black sports car apparently couldn’t wait and SWERVED AROUND THE VAN and almost ran straight into me. Car was so close I could feel it behind my legs and everything went in slow motion. Good thing I thought to start speeding up as I saw the light start to flash, signaling the end of being able to cross or I could have been hit.
The jerk sped away and I ran to the other end of the crosswalk a-okay. I was on the phone with my now husband when this went down and he heard everything. I broke down crying when I got to the other side and it wasn’t because I was almost hit. The thought that my husband could have heard my ending is what shook me up.
Image source: saabers
#50
I was walking home at 2am and these guys in a truck started trying to run me over and at the last second I dived into a small wooded/bramble area and went the 7 feet to fence behind it amd hid. They then tried to find me for a while and left.
I waited for an hour probably then decided to sneak out. I saw their truck sitting at the end of the alley with no power on, so I snuck along the wooded area till it merged with the road and made a break for it. They almost ran me over again, but I made it to the path behind a house that was too narrow for them to fit.
Probably 2 seconds from being ran over both times.
Image source: Snak_The_Ripper
#51
Got one! Rolled up over a small hill and signaled left. No oncoming traffic so I drift to the middle of the road on a lazy north Maine “highway”. Start to slow and hear screeching breaks… look to the rear view and only see grill of the pulp truck that just barreled over the hill. Impact. My truck is whipped around until I’m basically driver door to driver door with this semi. We slide across the oncoming lane and my truck drops into the ditch, but the pulp truck keeps going. The back of the rig starts tearing up my hood, then hits the crossbar by the door. More shattering glass. The whole side of the car begins to crumple towards me like a tin can. Can’t tell if it’s real time or I’m going to pass away slow-mo. Trailer and what’s left of my truck stops about 8 inches from my face/chest. Breath and exit with almost no injury.
Image source: sir_justthetip
#52
My boyfriend, myself and a friend of ours were night swimming. Another friend almost knocked an industrial flood light into the pool while we were in there and caught it by the cord at the last minute. The idea of that guy having ended a human life was funny enough to make the experience less scary but still, dang. We were almost gone! Wow.
Image source: alertronic5000
#53
Checking tire pressure on the drive tires of a semi. I was between the two rear axles and the front was raised on ramps. The brakes failed, I felt it shift and I slid out before it completely rolled off the ramp.
Image source: ripit4life
#54
I was working construction during summers back in high school. This is kinda hard to explain, but we were scrubbing the giant wooden beams that formed the support structure of this barn/garage that was around four stories tall with a chemical that made the wood look better. Dumbest job I’ve ever worked on.
Since it was a big building we were using wheeled scaffolding (with brakes) inside to get to the roof beams. This building, being a garage as well, had long drainage troughs running the length to drain fluids from vehicle repairs and whatever else. The problem is that the drainage troughs didn’t have grating over them at the time, leaving them completely open. So as I was moving my three story scaffold from one beam to the next, both of the wheels on my side fell into one of the drainage troughs. You ever read those stories about mothers lifting cars off their children? It was one of those moments. Adrenaline kicked in and I heaved all of that tube steel out and back onto level ground, saving myself from being crushed as the area I was in had nothing to stop all three stories from crashing down on my head. Nobody else saw a thing it all happened so fast. I took the next two days off work (happened on a Wednesday) so I had four days off to recover my sore muscles.
If I had been anywhere but exactly in the middle of the broad side of the scaffold, I would’ve been gone nine years ago. Alternatively, if I had been on the other side I would’ve ended one of the other workers.
I know this doesn’t fit the exact letter of the question, since it’s more about placement than timing, but people in real life don’t usually believe me so I don’t get many chances to tell it.
Image source: Psychwrite
#55
I was driving home pretty late at night after work when I still lived at my parents’ house. Their house is about half an hour out of town on a good day, and you have to take rural highways and gravel roads with plenty of steep hills and tight curves.
It was the first snow of the winter and it came very suddenly and heavily, the roads were completely covered and slippery. I was making my way home slowly, barely going over 20 mph. One second it seemed like everything was fine, the next second my car was sliding what seemed like way too quickly. It was moving at an angle directly across the oncoming lane of traffic while a semi was approaching and going way too fast to ever slow down in time in the snow. Thankfully, my car got across the road and hit a snow bank in the ditch before the semi got to me, but if my car had slid just a second later I can’t imagine that I’d still be alive.
So yeah, now I am deathly afraid of driving in snow and will do just about anything to avoid it.
Image source: lunarian7
#56
I was driving home late one night on a major freeway and on a curve when I turned the corner when I noticed the car in front of me suddenly slow to a stop and turn on their hazards, so I did the same (we were going 75 so this was very abrupt, and scary because there were cars behind me). The scene in front of me was horrific. A car had gotten on the freeway going the wrong way, and there were major collisions littered all over the freeway of people trying to avoid them, and not more than 10 feet away was the car that caused it all, totaled, facing me. I couldn’t even believe my eyes. No police, no fire department, and I was the first person to call 911.
With cars going 75 mph, one second later and I almost certainly would have been involved in one of those crashes. I think about that moment all the time and feel so lucky that I avoided it so narrowly.
Image source: klay-stan
#57
About to cross the road and a car zooms past from the wrong side.
I was lucky. Very lucky.
Image source: weakit
#58
This happened about a year ago.
I work as an installation engineer on large tanker vessels. I was installing a Torque meter on the shaft of a Chemical tanker.
I spent the first-hour explaining things to the Chief engineer, that I would need help from a member of his crew and that the shaft would be locked with the Turning gear and tagged out for 2 days. this should be no issue as the vessel was due to take 3 days to offload and be cleaned.
I get to the shaft and there isn’t much room. so I take up the floor above the shaft, sit on the shaft and begin attaching some sensors. I notice the crew member is being radioed in Korean (Korean crew), I don’t think anything of it until I notice he is gone. This is frustrating as I cannot work on the shaft alone due to health and safety, so I get up to go find him. as I get off the shaft I hear a huge jet of air and the engine fires up with the shaft engaged and turning Fast. I was so shocked as if I had been sitting where I was I would have been slammed into the surrounding metal by an engine that produces 5MWs of power on startup.
Bonus: obviously annoyed I went to “speak” to the chief, after explaining he had almost just ended me by removing two safety measures (including cutting a padlock off a breaker). he looked at me laughed and told me he had forgotten I was working down there.
I just picked up my tools and left the vessel, reported what happened to my boss and ripped up the Purchase Order and I took a flight home.
.
Image source: anon
#59
I was behind a car at a red light. It then turned green, the car in front turned right and I took a few extra seconds as I’d been turning on the aircon. As I took my foot off the brake another car (SUV) coming from the left (I’m in Australia) ran the red light doing the speed limit of 60km/hr. She slammed the brakes on and stopped in the centre of the intersection with a look of OMFG on her face. She was inches from hitting the car in front of me as he was turning.
If I hadn’t been fiddling with the aircon and gone immediately after the car in front that woman would’ve smacked into me, my passenger side, in my new car.
The next day I installed my dashcam which I’d kept forgetting to do.
Image source: ThadiusKlor
#60
I can’t be sure that I was a “second from being gone” exactly, but it was one of those moments that I really had to pause and think, and it shook me up pretty bad.
I used to commute about an hour each day to school via a main interstate, and one morning I was plodding along in slightly congested traffic in the middle lane of the three lanes. (I try to obey traffic laws and only use the left lane for passing only.) Suddenly in the left lane a loaded down dump truck flew past me going probably 90, and I remember yelling “You are going to hurt somebody!” in my car. About 15 seconds later, brake lights are all illuminated in front of me and we come to a stop.
That dump truck had rear ended a small vehicle and there was hardly anything left of it, it looked like pieces of tin foil were scattered in the road and wrapped around the axles of this truck. And the air smelt like burnt rubber. I pretty much cried for the remaining 45 minutes of my drive that morning, thinking how easily that could have been me. The part that is burned in my mind the most is that the man’s shoes (the driver of the small car) were in the road pretty far from his car. It just drove home the point that, man, there was definitely a human being in that wreckage.
Sorry for the downer but I guess it’s hard to have a happy story in a thread like this. I guess to extrapolate a positive message from it, don’t drive too fast to stop, especially if you drive a big vehicle, and don’t forget that all those cars on the road are filled with people with families – so drive like it.
Tl;dr – Was in a lane next to a horrible wreck on the interstate, the driver’s shoes were laying in the road from impact and it really shook me up.
Image source: anon
#61
Wasn’t me that could’ve been gone, but I had a car accident with a pedestrian several years ago – he was running across a busy road near (but not AT) a red light (where there was no crosswalk anyway) but I was driving up the turning lane to make a left so I was in motion. He was running between cars and came out of nowhere – hit my passenger side, bounced off the top right side and shattered that corner of my windshield. If I’d been a second or two behind, he could’ve been actually run over.
As it was, he begged my forgiveness and refused the ambulance (presumably no insurance)… and I had a two hour panic attack. Thankfully there was actually a cop car in the front of the line of oncoming traffic so they witnessed the whole thing, flipped their lights on and immediately took control of the scene, and vouched that there was nothing I could’ve done to avoid it. Scary stuff though, I hope that guy ended up ok.
Image source: rachelseaturtle
#62
I’m a volunteer firefighter in Australia and I had a really close call just a couple of months ago.
Got called out to a massive running wheat field fire, flames 12+ feet high moving at about 15 mph was terrifying and a real adrenaline rush because we were doing a direct attack ( rush up along side the edge of the fire and hit it directly from the back of the truck with a hose) was hot as hell and there is very little cover on the back of the truck, the heat and smoke was blinding and hard to handle but everything was going well until we got to a barb wire fence.
We pulled up to the fence a safe distance away from the fire’s edge and I jumped off the back of the truck with Bolt cutters to deal with the fence as I’m cutting it I hear the driver yell out trying to get my attention , what I see when I tern around to see whet he was telling about left me stunned, the wind had changed as I was cutting the fence and now just 10 feet away there’s a wall of flames rushing towards me and starting to overwhelm the truck. I quickly jump on the back of the truck as it quickly reverses away from the flames , the flames lapping at the side of the truck as we spray water on our selves to manage the heat.
Later I watched the dash cam footage from the fire truck and it showed the fire engulfing the spot I was standing just seconds after I started running back to the truck for safety
Everyone was silent on the truck for a good ten minutes after that like we all collectively went “dang we nearly passed away”.
Image source: pinkybandit89
Follow Us
