My partner and I went in the backdoor of a house and about 2 seconds later the branchman opened the front door which created a backdraft situation. It's not like in the movies where the flames wave at you and dance around. It's a blowtorch that can kill you. We were lucky.

Looks like you will be very sore for the next week or two. Best wishes on a speedy recovery.

Fortunately no alcohol involved and the discomfort is improving. Very stiff all over.

IMHO, this wasn't something that qualifies for a Darwin award.

Widgeon was trying to accomplish something work related and misjudged the situation.

Very common occurrence....not worthy of the award....;)

Darwin awards are usually reserved for the terminally stupid or foolish.

Jeebsus. And I just threw out my back this morning bending over to pick up a t-shirt.

Glad you're (relatively) OK.

No award if not 'selected"...maybe an honerable mention! :)

Sorry to see you are messed up.

Hope you feel better soon.

As to your original question, way too many times.

I really should not be here at all.

Gotta job and worked hard.
Bought a home and fixed it up.
Met a gal and stayed true.

I'm feeling better with every wake-up but very stiff and a lot of bruising.

Thanks for all the replies.

Had a tractor (Farmall Cub) almost flip up over on me, but I punched the clutch at the right time. Sat in the driveway and considered what happened while I waited for my legs to quit shaking. I figure less than 1/4 of a second separated finishing cutting the lawn and being smashed to death in the driveway.

Hey, it is just another lesson for us all!

Best to ya for a speedy recovery.

I was about 12 y/o, shooting my 22 in the basement, unsupervised, standing at one end of the basement with my back to the wall, and firing at target on wall on the other end. Didn't have a proper backstop. Pulled trigger and heard a cracking noise behind me. Turned around and saw a small crater in the wall at head level. Measured and determined the ricocheting bullet had passed a few inches from my right ear. Never forgot that lesson in gun safety.

Been in that similar situation more than once unfortunately. Had a garage fire one night, that had unknowingly spread into the second floor of an extremely tight house. Entered the front door to make an attack and was blown off the porch, while the second floor lit up and blew one of the side walls out. Luckily just minor injuries.


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Somebody sign Scott Dixon up for this thread...

I lived in St. Croix for about a year. Probably logged over 100 dives while I was there. My dive buddy and I decided we would see how deep we could go. Started at 150 feet. We'd dive down, have a look around and then finish out the dive at around 90 feet. Couple of days later - 160. Then 170 etc. Well the big day arrived. 200 feet was the goal, on air.

We descended nice and slow. The nitrogen narcosis started hitting me around 160. By the time I got to 200, I was totally narced! I looked at my depth gauge - 206. My buddy was pointing up, but I couldn't much function at that point. So I panicked and hit my inflator. I was rising at the same rate as my exhaled bubbles, which further freaked me out. For some reason, I kept trying to get out of the plume of bubbles. Finally, I felt my BCD pressing hard against my chest and I realized that it was totally inflated and I was rocketing to the surface. I pulled the dump valve and let off the pressure.

In the meantime, my buddy had grabbed on to my BCD and was being hauled up along with me. When I looked at my depth gauge it read 60 feet. We descended to 80 feet and sat there for the rest of the dive.

Embolism, the bends, freaking out and pulling my regulator or worse, my buddie's regulator... These were all possibilities. All for finding out that it's cold and dark at 200 feet - even in a tropical paradise.

Yep. It's odd how people (like me) can sometimes disregard potential bad situations in an environment that's totally alien, when you've been navigating in it for a long time. I should have resurfaced after the first time the regulator malfunctioned. My buddy & I stayed within sight of each other, so I was able to signal my air had stopped and I had to go up. Bought a new regulator after that dive.

Learning to ride a motorcycle on a Yamaha V-max

Joined the Marine Corps during the height of the Viet Nam war. That almost got me killed.

More than my fair share!
 

Nearly having a Massey Ferguson farm tractor tip over on me after accidentally dropping the rear differential when replacing the brakes. Gravity and heavy equipment will win every time!

Learning to ride motorcycles on a Ducati Monster 900 (earned an ambulance ride for that one!). Decided that motorcycles really were not in my best interest, but, man, that was the closest I thought I could get to a Ferrari!

Working on piping on aircraft carrier weapons elevators during my shipyard days when someone decided to cycle a hydraulically operated door. Sliced the back of my leather boot off like it was butter. I was a little jittery after that one. Could have easily been the front of my foot, my hand, or worse. Shipyards being one of the deadliest places to work is well (or maybe badly) deserved.

Then they wouldn't let me within 100 miles of a shipyard!