1) as a teen was in passenger seat of my buddies car driving home from work on a dark rainy day... we made a left turn and I then saw a glimpse of this white car bearing down on us as we made our turn...it had its lights out "look out John!!" I yelled, John hit the gas and we sped up just slightly enough for this car to WHAM hit us in the rear quarterpanel. He was going about 50MPH with the lights out on a rainy cold night.

If John hadnt sped up that car would have directly hit me in the door of his 80 Ford Futura and I probably would have been seriously hurt or killed...so I was about 1 foot from death.

The drivers of the other car stopped and dumped out a bunch of beers...they were toasted drunk.

2) 7 years ago i came home and my power was out...my 80 year old neighbor came over...it was a driving rainstorm....he said that my electrical box had shorted out and they saw a flame rise from it... we called Edison and I got into my garage...the Edison guy came out and said that since the box was on the outside of the house we would have to fix it ourselves....

I went to the hardware store and got a new power cable and some supplies... and we went to work on it...Me, and my 2 Octogenarian neighbors each who had lived in my neighborhood for over 50 years.

It was a simple job to switch out this cable, but was dark and cold and rainy... At one point I had this screwdriver in my hands while the other guys were doing something and somehow...STUPID ME...I let my hand go up towards the top LIVE Terminal of 220V..... Suddenly I felt my hand start to get a shock and go numb...

just then my 80 year old neighbor somehow knocked my arm away just before my screwdriver hit the terminal...I came within an inch or two of being electrocuted and the old man amazingly was aware of it and literally saved my life...

my arm hurt for a couple hours after from the voltage that started to get to me... it was a really dumb thing for me to do and i was very thankful for my neighbor.

And then there was that time I was sitting next to you in your targa, you floored it, the gas pedal got stuck with a 90degree turn coming up...

Oh yeah...I dont remember this, but when I was a little baby my mom found me blue in my crib and not breathing...she revived me and took me to emergency room...turned out that I had a hole in my heart and oxygenated blood was being mixed with deoxygenated blood.

I got that once from a shaky overweight philly police woman who mistook me for a perp. She had a glock. No safety, short trigger pull. Finger on the trigger. Her eyes wide with fear.

It was terrifying.

This post brings back memories.... Not good ones. Mid-80's in Central America... nuff said.

You get back to base and get a drink in your hand then start shaking after you realize just how close you came. The burns took my hair off from the waist up and medics did what they could then went to the hospital.

Then there was the guys who jumped out of the jungle in El Salvador with AK's and did an impromptu check of our car. You come so close yet it was not your time..

Its beating death that makes you think and realize how precious life is...

Did for me as well, only I never hit the ground without intent. Always in the back of my mind, though:cool:

Blew the tranny at over 130 mph in my Pro-street Chevy S-10 when I was in college. The driveshaft imbedded in the concrete and pull-vaulted the back of the truck off the ground. I coasted back home over 2 miles (I lived on a straight as an arrow State Road). When it happened, I thought I just dropped the drive shaft. ....When I went to put it back in, I saw that the only thing left of the tranny was 1/4 of the bellhousing, still attached to the engine.

Ahh, impetuous youth.

In High School, 6 friends and I piled into a Chevy Sprint (very small sub compact car). The driver was messing around and jerked the steering wheel back and forth. He lost control of the car and rolled it 3 times. I was not wearing a seatbelt and was ejected. Very very sore for a few weeks.

As a cop, I was dispatched with my trainee (I was a Field Training Officer) into a school where someone claimed a sniper from a nearby project housing was. I did not believe it, and as we walked near a building, we took several rounds. The sniper opened up on us with a long rifle. My trainee froze and I had to tackle him to get him out of the line of fire. Never did find the sniper despite the hundred officers and helicopter I called.

As a cop, I entered a fully engulfed house in an attempt to rescue 3 people and a fireman. I saved the fireman and 1 person. The person was was burnt over 90% of her body and died a week later. I was awarded the medal of valor. It was the dumbest thing that I have ever done, but would do it again.

Was working in South Central LA, and turned into a street right in the middle of a gunfight. Thugs were shooting it out with AK47s.......

Working South Central, I was driving down the street and saw an armed robbery right in front of me. It was a long foot pursuit with a knock down fight. The bad guy lost and went to jail.

Working in a jail, a Mexican Mafia member sawed through the bars of his cell armed with a jail made knife (shank). I entered the area unknowing that the thug was out of his cell and armed. The fight was on for my life. My martial arts training prevailed and he was off to the hospital.

I could go on and on..........I guess the life of a cop is kinda wreckless......David

Wow, that's a lot of tough stuff you guys have gone through!

I don't have anything that even comes close.

I got another one.

Back in college at UCSB, I went sailing off the coast of Goleta in a friend's Hobie Cat. It was a beautiful March day with a light breeze and a good weather forecast. Within minutes, everything changed as the wind whipped up to 40 mph and the swells rose to 12 feet. We capsized and were in the water for 3 hours. You don't know cold until you've done that.

We were being blown offshore and were pretty much screwed, when a private plane happened to fly right over us. Within 30 minutes, the Coast Guard was fishing us out of the water. My body temp was 92.

I was coming in from a fishing trip with the boat fully loaded with about 60,000 lbs. The boat took a big roll from a particularly large wave. The boards that divide the fish hold up into sections broke and the load started shifting causing the boat to list over. I went down below to wake up the sleeping crew man. By the time I got back outside, the boat was leaning over about 45 degrees and not coming back.I put out a Mayday call on the radio but didn't have time to give any details. We climbed up the ladder to the roof of the cabin. The crew man grabbed the EPIRB while I released the life raft from its cradle. I threw the raft over and we jumped into the water as the boat started to go all the way over on its side. We swam to the raft and climbed in. The boat started going under and the mast and antennas were tangling up with the raft. As we struggled to clear ourselves of that mess, the boat disappeared, headed for the bottom. It was really creepy seeing it slip beneath the waves. Even after it was all the way under, I could see some of the lights on. We floated around out there for about 4 hours in the raft. We were both freezing since this was March and the water was about 50 degrees. The crewman was in pretty bad shape from the cold. A coast guard helicopter appeared on the horizon so I shot some flares off as it was now just about dark. The CG sent a rescue swimmer in to get us over into the basket that they lowered from the helo.The crew of the helo raised us up into it and gave us some blankets. They flew us to Vandenburg Air Force Base since it was the closest facility to our location where the copter could land and get fuel. We were about 30 miles off shore when the boat sank. The crewman was treated for hypothermia and I was released from the base hospital after they checked me out. I didn't want to fishing anymore for a couple of months after that, but got over those feelings and bought another boat. I still get a little jumpy though when my boat takes a weird roll!:eek: 2; Several years later, I picked up some strange illness. I went to several doctors and ended up at an infectious disease specialist. I was in the hospital for a week but nobody could figure out what was causing my condition. I had a fever that floated up and down between 100 and 105 degrees for 30 days. When the fever would spike, I would have uncontrollable shivering. I would wrap up in blankets and lay in the sun to try and control it. As quickly as it began, the fever disappeared one day.All that was left was a rash which the doctor called a post fever rash which also went away a few days later. I lost 29 pounds in that month and the doctor told me during a follow up visit that he thought that they were going to lose me.:(

Desert Storm...

Almost shot in the head. Had the bullet hit the tree stump half an inch higher, it would have gone through and into my head.

Plenty of other times, but those were in the name of fun.

Desert Storm as well...........

I think the shots of junk the military gave us was more dangerous than the Iraquis though.........

David

DavidI
If I ever get the pleasure of meeting you at a Pelican function the drinks are on me!
Thanks for your service to our Country and our city.
Steve

I was 12 years old in my dads boat taking a nap and when i woke up, collapsed and stopped breathing from carbon monoxide poisoning.

I would not be here today if my father did not see me on the cabin floor and was glad he knew how to perform mouth to mouth to get me breathing again.

I had the most painful headache afterwords that seemed to last forever but it was sure better then what could have happened.

The front fork of my Mt Bike Sheared off just under the head tube. I was told I landed on my head but my helmet never even cracked. I was in a coma over a month with no memory of who I was. It took lots of nightmares, pictures, and training to regain a lot of missing stuff. Maybe that's why I'm a little weird today.....

Steve, I look forward to it!

David

I'm not sure which was closer to death...

The .38 6 inches from my nose held by the scared and lost druggy at a house party we were throwing, or the bullets ricocheting off the bricks all around me from the thieves escaping in a car after trying to rob someone in the parking lot of the bar I bounced at.

One was a guaranteed death if the trigger was pulled, while the other actually involved flying bullets. Both were pretty annoying, but ultimately, of no consequence. The 277V wild leg of a 3 phase power supply through my back was more annoying, but probably less lethal.

September 1986, I was doing a dive on the USS San Diego. a WWI cruiser that sunk off the coast of Long Island. Wrecks in 120 ft of water. On my second penetration dive, I wanted to get into an area on the wreck that I couldn't fit into with my normal double tank setup. So I went down with a single. It was only to be a real quick dive to retrieve a rack of rifles I had seen.
I had to go about 30 ft into the wreck and down one deck (the wreck is upside down in the sand) I get in, Im working on digging out the rifles. My buddy is about 15 ft below me in a different compartment waiting for me. All of a sudden my regulator feels like its not working. I go to take another breath, and nothing. I look at my guage and I have about 200lbs of air left. Im thinking somethings wrong I cant be that low. I swim toward the opening to get out of the compartment and my BC hangs up on something. I try to get it loose and now my air is almost gone I could hardly get a breath. Now I start getting nervous. I try to get my buddy's attention swingin my light back and forth but he is turned around. Im holding my breath trying to squeeze out of the compartment and I feel like my chest is gonna explode. I finally get to him, i grab his octopus( spare regulator) go to take a breath. but in my panic I didn't clear the water from it first. I swallow a mouthful of water which adds to my panic. Now I have to swim the 30 ft to get out and about 100 ft back to the surface. I take a deep breath of air I go to swim out of the wreck. just as I get near the hole in the wreck. I feel myself starting to get dizzy and black out. Needless to say, I fuchin lost it. I shot for the surface swam to the anchor line, knocked 2 people off it on the way up. I was due for a 5 min decomp. I hit the surface just as I started to black out . The mates on the boat had to jump in the water to get me.

Took a while to do another wreck dive after that one!:D