A hiker from New York says he’s lucky to be alive after he was pinned for more than seven hours under a 5-tonne rock — leaving him so convinced he was going to die, he asked his friend to call his mum so he could say goodbye.
Kevin DePaolo, 28, was hiking in California’s Sierra Nevada Mountains with his friend Joshua Nelson, 38, on Dec. 5 when the boulder came loose and landed on top of him, KRNV reported.
“I’m like digging under this big rock, and I think it’s leaning against this other rock,” he told the outlet. “I didn’t know that it was actually on this loose sand.”
The rock fell on DePaolo’s leg and chest, pinning him in a hole he had dug in a rocky area of the Inyo National Forest.
“It felt like being hit by a refrigerator,” he told the New York Times of the estimated 10,000-pound stone.
“I could see all these weird things on my feet that you’re not supposed to see,” she added.
“I was able to tear off my trouser leg, grab my numb leg that I couldn’t feel at all, pull it out from under the rock, and move my body so that if the rock had continued down the hill, it wouldn’t have crushed my whole body, ” he told KRNV.
Kevin DePaolo was seriously injured when a 5-ton boulder landed on top of him and trapped him for hours in the mountains of California. Kevin DePaolo
“It would roll all over my legs,” added DePaolo, who is from New York but lives out of his van and travels across the US in search of adventure.
“I actually told my friend Josh Nelson to call my mom, I’m going to tell her I’m going to die here,” he said. “There’s no way I’m getting out of here.”
Nelson spent more than six hours on the phone with 911 as Inyo Search and Rescue workers headed to the crash site.
“They started coming at me from downhill, and I thought, ‘Oh my God, I might actually make it out of here alive,'” DePaolo told KRNV.
The pedestrian was rescued by a US Navy medic who escaped from a helicopter. Inyo County Search & Rescue
He ended up under Santa Rita Flats near Independence, the agency said on Facebook.
“With the help of the Air Operations helicopter of the Central Division of the California Highway Patrol H40, two members of the rescue team were included via helicopter to Santa Rita Flat, while seven other members of the team followed the vehicle that navigated the network for four-wheel drive roads,” he said.
The rescue team found “the hiker in great pain with his left leg stuck under a boulder on a steep hillside. Team members estimate the rock to weigh between 6,000 and 10,000 pounds.”
DePaolo was crushed by the rock, which was finally removed about seven hours later. Inyo County Search & Rescue
Teams used ropes and pulleys to move enough rock to allow DePaolo to be freed.
“Due to the serious pedestrian injuries and difficult terrain, it was decided to evacuate the pedestrians even in the dark using a helicopter from US Naval Air Station Lemoore,” Inyo Search and Rescue said.
But no suitable landing site was nearby, so a US Navy medic stepped out of the helicopter to remove DePaolo from the scene and take him to a hospital in Fresno, according to the agency.
“It was really, really amazing and really impressive,” DePaolo told KRNV of the rescue. “I feel like I’m in good hands and I’m finally safe for once.”
His pelvis was cracked in two places and the femoral artery in his left leg was severed.
He may have nerve damage, but he didn’t break any bones in his leg and doctors were able to save his leg. In a few months, he will be able to walk again, he told the San Francisco Chronicle.
The 28-year-old pedestrian fractured his pelvis in two places and suffered a severed femoral artery in his left leg. GoFundMe
DePaolo told the Chronicle that he can now sit upright and is expected to walk again in a few months.
“I am very grateful to be alive,” he told KRNV. “I go hiking every day, no matter what. I go hiking every day, and my legs are an important part of my life, and it won’t be the same if I lose my legs.
DePaolo still requires extensive plastic surgery and intensive physical therapy.
“I’m very grateful to be alive,” DePaolo said. GoFundMe
A GoFundMe page set up by DePaolo’s close friend Carson Ray said the hiker was out “doing what he loves most — exploring the great outdoors of North America — in California’s Inyo Mountains with no clue that he was in the middle of life-threatening encounter.
“This massive rock behemoth shifted, pinning Kev for nearly 7 hours of excruciating physical pain,” he wrote.
“But thanks to the heroic efforts of a superbly coordinated incident response between the Inyo County Sheriff’s Office, Inyo County Search and Rescue, and the US Navy, Kev was freed when rescuers implemented a system of ropes, pulleys, leverage, and sheer determination,” Ray continued.
Kevin DePaolo is from New York but lives out of his van on his way to the country. GoFundMe
“Surviving such odds is a miracle (and obviously a lot of training and courage on the part of the rescuers), which shows that when it’s not your time to go, it’s not your time to go,” he added.
“The road to recovery lay long ahead, and the medical bills were getting bigger because he didn’t have medical insurance,” Ray said. The account raised about $8,370 as of Tuesday morning.
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Source: thtrangdai.edu.vn/en/
