Incredible stories of survival against all odds. Incredible stories of people who survived in extreme conditions

Imagine that the clock is three o'clock in the afternoon, and you have not had dinner yet. All your thoughts begin to revolve around food.

Most people who skip meals or leave their jackets at home in cold weather find their day ruined. The slightest feeling of hunger or cold makes you feel uncomfortable. But what would you do if you were in difficult situation on the verge of survival?

This article presents ten incredible stories about people who have had much worse than you with your hopelessly ruined day.

The man who drifted on a raft on the high seas for 76 days

In 1982 Stephen Callahan American writer, a naval architect, inventor and sailor, collected all available materials from wood and built a boat on which he sailed from the Canary Islands. He took with him a little more than a kilogram of food, about four liters of water, a solar watermaker and a homemade spear.

Six days after the start of the trip, Stephen Callahan's boat sank, as a result of which he was forced to drift in the open sea on a wooden raft measuring 1.5 x 1.5 meters for 76 days until he was rescued. During this time, Callahan's raft covered a distance of almost 3,000 kilometers. The man managed to survive in spite of everything, including the attacks of bloodthirsty sharks.

The teenage girl who survived the crash of a plane that fell from a height of three thousand meters into the depths of the rainforest

On Christmas Eve 1971, seventeen-year-old Juliana Margaret Koepcke flew LANSA Flight 508 with her mother to Pucallpa, where her father worked. None of them suspected that due to an absurd accident (a lightning strike), the plane would crash, and Juliana would become the only person who would be able to survive in a terrible plane crash. A girl with cut wounds and a broken collarbone wandered the jungle for nine days in search of help. She survived in wild environment thanks to her parents, who from childhood taught her how to cope with extreme situations.

A teenager who lived in the wild for two months

In November 2013, eighteen-year-old teenager Matthew Allen, who has a mental disorder, left home without things and a mobile phone and did not return. Two months later, he was found covered in leeches in the Australian bush. During this time, he partially lost his sight, lost about 30 kilograms and developed gangrene of the lower extremities.

For two months, Matthew Allen saved himself by drinking water from an almost dry stream.

Two men who survived a car crash and spent ten days looking for help

Uruguayan rugby players Nando Parrado and Roberto Caneza were among those lucky enough to survive the crash passenger aircraft in the Andes in 1972. Then, as a result of the crash, 29 people died.

Nando Parrado, Roberto Canesa and other surviving passengers (in total, sixteen people managed to escape) wandered the mountains for ten days in search of help. To survive in frosty conditions, they had to resort to cannibalism: for a week they ate the flesh of dead people.

In 1974 British writer Pierce Paul Reid wrote Alive: The Story of the Andes Survivors about the survivors of the 1972 Andes plane crash, which later became a bestseller. Later, the story described in the book was the basis for the plot of the film "Alive", which was written by Ethan Hawke.

In turn, in 2006, Nando Parrado published the book Miracle in the Andes: 72 Days in the Mountains and My Long Way Home.

Man who had to amputate his arm to survive being trapped

The story of American mountaineer Aron Ralston was the basis of the plot of the film "127 Hours" with James Franco in the title role.

In 2003, Aron Ralston put on his boots, packed a hydration backpack, climbing gear, a folding hiking tool, loaded his mountain bike into the back of his truck, and set out on a five-hour drive across Utah to do the solo hike he never knew about. didn't say.

During the passage of the Blue John Canyon in national park Canyonlands Ralston accidentally found himself in a dangerous trap: a huge boulder weighing 360 kilograms fell on his right hand. The climber spent 5 days with his right hand clamped under a boulder. When food and water supplies were exhausted, and Ralston was faced with a matter of life and death, he plucked up courage and did the unthinkable - he amputated his right hand with a blunt folding knife.

Despite severe pain shock and a bleeding wound, Ralston managed to get out of the crevice. He walked for several hours under the scorching sun, until he finally came across a group of tourists who gave him first aid and called a rescue helicopter.

The climber who woke up from a deep hypothermic coma that lasted eighteen hours

In 1996, Dr. Seaborn Beck, along with nine climbers, decided to fulfill his cherished dream and conquer the mighty peak of Everest. Unfortunately, this attempt turned into a nightmare that changed Dr. Seaborn's life forever.

During the ascent of Everest, he fell into a deep hypothermic coma, in which he remained for eighteen hours. Dr. Seaborn nearly died. He miraculously managed to survive, but not without terrible consequences. Subsequently, doctors amputated his upper and lower limbs, and also removed frostbite skin from his face. However, Dr. Seaborn is not discouraged, he enjoys his life like never before.

In his book Left for Dead, Dr. Seaborn writes: “At the last moment, some unknown inner strength saved me from death. I, barely dragging my feet (literally like walking Dead), got to the camp where my rebirth took place ... ". His book formed the basis of the plot of two films - "Left for Dead" and "Everest".

Two men who got lost in the Amazon rainforest and lived there for three weeks

In 1981, the young and naive Yossi Ginsberg, along with several of his friends and like-minded people, went to explore the Amazon rainforest and got lost in its wilds. At this point, the travelers realized that they had very little food left.

After a quarrel arose between the friends, which ended with the fact that two of them left, separated from the group, and no one else saw them. Ginsberg was left alone with Kevin. During the three weeks that they spent in the jungle, they had a hard time. Ginsberg's raft crashed into the rocks; he ended up cut off from Kevin and so they were forced to split up. Yossi spent 19 days alone in the jungle, after Kevin found him and rescued him.

A teenage girl who was seriously injured in a horrific car accident, but was able to walk again despite everything.

At the age of seventeen, Katrina Burgess signed a contract with modeling agency. Just a few months before, she had had to endure a terrible accident. She ended up in the hospital with a broken neck, pelvis, left leg, spine, and punctured lungs. The doctors said she would never walk again. Katrina underwent countless operations and, despite all the disappointing forecasts of doctors, she got on her feet.

The man who fell from the 47th floor and survived

In 2007, two brothers Alkid and Edgar Moreno washed windows in a New York building. Unfortunately, they forgot to put on their seat belts that day, which caused a terrible tragedy. The brothers fell off the height of the 47th floor and flew down.

From his injuries, Edgar died on the spot, and Alkid miraculously managed to survive. He was admitted to the hospital with numerous fractures of the ribs, right arm, both legs, as well as a serious spinal injury. Alcides fell into a coma, but eventually came to his senses and was able to walk again.

According to Dr. Philip Barry, who treated Alcides Moreno, it was truly a miracle.

The Man Who Survived a Hippo Attack

Having served in british army, Paul Templer returned to his homeland, in Zimbabwe, where he got a job as a river guide. One of the trips along the river almost ended in tragedy for Paul.

In 1995, a man witnessed how a huge hippo attacked his colleague. He did not stand aside and tried to help the poor fellow.

When Paul got close to the hippopotamus, it opened its large mouth and swallowed it whole. The man somehow managed to escape from the mouth of the animal, but he received a serious injury to his hand, because of which it had to be amputated. Despite this, Paul continues to work as a river guide until now.

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Are you looking for this? Perhaps this is what you could not find for so long?

At times, people find themselves in situations that seem to leave no chance of salvation. But sometimes a miracle happens. We present a selection of the most extreme cases in which a person survived.

In a plane crash in 1971, the girl could have died three times, but miraculously survived

The girl, who was 17 years old, flew in an airplane over the selva of Peru. The liner was struck by lightning, after which it fell apart. After hitting the ground, 15 people out of 92 survived, but all of them, except Juliana, died from their injuries before help arrived. The girl was more fortunate: the fall from a height of 3 km was softened by the crowns of trees, and she escaped with a torn knee ligament, a broken collarbone and numerous cuts.

Some time after the disaster, Juliana became a zoologist.

For 9 days, Juliana wandered through the forest before she managed to reach the river. There she met lumberjacks who took her to the hospital. According to the girl, all this time she could hardly sleep because of the clouds of insects. Based on this story, the film "Miracles Still Happen" was filmed.

The Man Who Learned to Survive in the Desert

Due to a sandstorm, the Italian lost his direction, and, as it turned out later, ended up in another state

Mauro, 39, an Italian police officer, was a participant in the Marathon de Sables. This is a 250 km race through the Sahara desert, which lasts 6 days. On the way, Mauro was overtaken by a sandstorm. The man got lost, but continued to move forward.

After being rescued in the 1994 Marathon, Mauro Prosperi had to recover for about two to three years.

In the bed of a dried up river, Prosperi found plants that he ate. I drank my urine. Then he went to the ruined mosque, where there were hordes of bats, caught and ate them. In desperation, he tried to open the veins, but the blood had thickened so much due to lack of water that the suicide attempt failed. The nomads stumbled upon him. The marathon runner walked through the desert for a total of 300 km in 9 days and lost 18 kg.

extreme ocean survival

Before the ship crashed, the Baileys managed to take some things necessary for life

A married couple from the UK traveled on their own yacht. Off New Zealand, the ship was attacked by a whale and sank. Marilyn and Maurice managed to transfer to an inflatable raft. With them they managed to take a canister of water, some canned food, knives. The food soon ended, and the food of the spouses was fish caught on hooks made of pins and plankton.

Later, Marilyn Bailey's book "117 Days Adrift" was published.

They were discovered by North Korean sailors. The Baileys were in the open ocean for 117 days, having swum during this time about 2000 km. They were completely exhausted, they were barely able to save.

accident in the jungle

Yossi was found three weeks later, when there was almost no hope of salvation

Yossi, 21, and his buddy Kevin, Israeli travelers, were rafting down a river in Bolivia. The raft was taken to the waterfall. Kevin managed to climb onto the shore, but Yossi was swept away by the current. He was left alone in the jungle.

Later, on the Discovery Channel came out documentary"I shouldn't have survived"

The guy's food was snails, bird eggs, berries. He was attacked by a jaguar, but Ginsberg managed to make a fire and drive the predator away. Yossi almost drowned in the swamp, survived the flood. After 19 days, he was discovered by a rescue team organized by Kevin.

The story of Ginsberg's survival formed the basis of the 2017 psychological thriller The Jungle, starring Daniel Radcliffe. Initially, the seats on the plane of the spouses were in its middle part, but, by chance, they had to sit in the tail

The 20-year-old student was returning to Blagoveshchensk with her husband Vladimir. ended Honeymoon. The newlyweds wanted to fly a day later, but they could not get tickets. The spouses had seats in the middle part of the AN-24 aircraft, but they took empty seats in the tail of the liner. During the flight, Larisa fell asleep.

She woke up from a strong shock and a terrible frost and realized that the plane was falling. As it turned out later, the liner collided with a Tu-16K bomber, which was performing weather reconnaissance. The girl saw a film about the survivor Julian Koepke, and tried during those eight minutes that the plane fell, to group and take the most optimal position. The liner dived into birch grove.

The plane on which the couple was flying crashed at an altitude of 5 km

The first thing she saw was the body of her dead husband. Larisa herself had a spinal injury and multiple fractures, but she was in a state of shock and did not feel pain. Rescuers found her after only 2 days. Of the 38 people on board, Larisa was the only survivor.

Of course, these salvation stories can be called lucky chance. But it should also be noted the amazing resilience, understanding of the situation and self-control of people in trouble, which ultimately helped them survive.

Man rose to the top of the evolutionary pyramid not only because he managed to get on his feet and learn how to harvest. The main thing that distinguishes him from other creatures is the awareness of impending death. Thanks to this, people can take care of safety in advance and make the right decisions in the most extreme situations.

Survival stories are terrifying and impressive at the same time. The awareness of death helped to make decisions that are contrary to common sense. But it was thanks to them that the heroes of our 7 stories were able to tell about their salvation.

Survive in the Sahara without water

Extreme marathons are a way to test your endurance in conditions that are difficult for a normal existence, even for those who have all the adaptations and an adequate supply of water and food. Mauro Prosperi participated in the Sand Marathon for the first time. The distance of 250 km ran through the desert.

The first stage of the foot race went according to plan. But one day there was a sandstorm. Mauro waited for her in the tent. When I got out of it, I saw that the landscape had changed beyond recognition. All participants had a compass and a map, but navigation without starting point unsuccessful. The athlete just started walking through the desert. The supply of water ran out and he peed into the bottle to save at least some grams of the liquid.

On the 3rd day he came to the tomb. It was protection from the sun and the sandy wind. Bats were hiding in the room. Mauro drank the blood of 20 individuals - this helped replenish the supply of fluid in the body. 2 planes did not notice the smoke of his flares, at that moment despair washed over him. The man cut his veins and fell asleep ... But in the morning he woke up alive and saw that the blood had simply coagulated. It was a "second wind" - he realized that death did not want to take him away.

Mauro Prosperi moved through the desert behind the clouds, which were only in the morning. During the day he rested, fed on the blood of lizards, chewed cacti. Oriented by animal excrement. On the 9th day I went to the oasis. There he was found by a tribe of Berbers. For 9 days of living in the desert, he lost 16 kg of weight, walked 300 km. The marathon runner managed to survive not only because of his excellent physical fitness:

• clarity of thought and calmness helped to find sources of liquid;
• knowledge of the characteristics of the desert - to avoid overheating and burns;
• the athlete somehow activated forgotten and deeply hidden instincts in himself.

In glaciers on one leg

Joe Simpson was a member of the climbing team, which consisted of three people. He and his climbing partner, Simon Yates, set off together to the summit of Siula Grande, leaving Richard Hawkins at the camp.

There were only 15-20 meters to the top when Joe fell off a cliff and hit his foot on a rock ledge. The leg bone went through the knee joint and split the lower part of the tibia. A healthy partner began to organize the descent. Weather conditions and loose snow complicated this process.

A little less than 1 km of height remained before the camp, when they realized that there was a steep cliff below. Simpson hung over a cliff, under which there was a huge crack. Simon was in an equally dangerous position: loose snow dispersed under him and the risk of falling off along with a wounded partner increased. Simon waited an hour in the hope that Simpson would get to a safe position. But the rope remained taut. Simon cut it...

The loose snow cushioned Joe's fall. He had a choice - to wait for death or to take the insignificant chance that the situation left him. He started down the crack. 40 meters were covered in 5 hours, but there were 9 km ahead. With a painful shock, in an altered state of consciousness, Joe moved, surrendering to the will of the delusional voice that was heard in his head. The climber literally crawled to the camp, from which Simon and Richard were going to leave in a few hours.

Joe Simpson's survival was successful due to the following factors:

• eating snow helped to maintain strength;
• the climber chose, albeit insignificant, but a chance for life;
• in a state of altered consciousness, basic instincts aimed at survival were activated.

Prisoner of the ocean

Many have heard of the movie Life of Pi, but few people know that most of the survival devices were invented in a real situation. Stephen Callahan is an experienced yachtsman, inventor of navigational instruments, yacht designer, who was recognized by the world thanks to his 76-day drifting in a boat on Atlantic Ocean.

Callahan went into a solo race in a sloop of his own design. One night there was a storm and his ship collided with a whale in the sea. The traveler managed to get into the lifeboat. After the storm subsided, he carried off his sinking sloop his minimum for survival - a watermaker, a supply of food, a flashlight and a guide to surviving in large waters.

During the drifting, 9 ships passed him, he was poisoned by the paint that peeled off the distiller, received sunburn of the 3rd degree, sharks attacked his boat and struggle with himself - madness and panic seized him more and more often.

Callahan's boat was thrown onto the island and a day later he was found by local fishermen. Stephen Callahan is only person who managed to survive in the captivity of the World Ocean, but his salvation - real feat. Helped him:

• professional experience;
• ability to endure social isolation;
• cold-blooded prioritization (for example, he endured the pain of ulcers, but drinking water kept for internal use.
• scurvy was saved by drinking the blood of fish and birds.

Reasons why people manage to survive in unrealistic conditions

1. The choice of life. From that moment on, the subconscious starts a certain program to activate the ancient instincts. Disgust and fear go away, and in their place comes the ability to see and use all the chances that every moment of life presents.
2. Body endurance. In the desert, in the mountains, on the water - everywhere these people fought with nature, having previously increased their physiological endurance threshold.
3. Adaptability. Each of them accepted the terms environment and began his survival marathon with them in mind.

Thanks to these stories, we get not only the knowledge of how to be in an extreme situation, but also the fact that the price of life is so high that it is better to avoid such tests.

There are people who, thanks to luck and resourcefulness, defied nature and survived in the most difficult conditions. Here are their stories, which, although they seem incredible, are real.

1. Anna Bagenholm - revived after freezing

Anna Elisabeth Johansson Bågenholm is a radiologist who survived an accident in 1999 after spending 80 minutes in icy water under a layer of ice.

During this time, her body temperature dropped to 13.7°C, the lowest temperature that a person has survived hypothermia.

Anna was sliding down a steep slope, but lost control and fell headfirst into a frozen stream near a waterfall. The head and torso of the girl were under water under a 20-centimeter layer of ice, while her legs and skis remained above the ice.

Anna found an air pocket between ice and water and was able to breathe for 40 minutes. It took 80 minutes to rescue her from the water, and when they pulled her out, she showed no signs of life. After she was taken to the hospital, they tried to resuscitate the girl, and only after 3 hours her heart began to beat again.

She was alive and paralyzed, but gradually recovered. Doctors claim that she managed to survive due to the fact that her body fell into a state of "hibernation".

2 Mauro Prosperi Survived 9 Days In The Sahara Desert

Marathon runner Mauro Prosperi survived in the Sahara desert for more than a week without food or water. During a marathon in Morocco, a sandstorm caused him to lose his way and walk in the wrong direction for about 300 kilometers.

Mauro drank his urine to survive, walked only in the morning and evening, and rested during the day. He found a small chapel, caught some bats and drank their blood (meat). bat cause more dehydration).

The marathon runner even tried to commit suicide, wrote a note to his wife and cut his veins, but his blood thickened and coagulated.

This became a sign for the man, and he decided to continue on his way. 5 days after they left the chapel and 8 days of drinking almost nothing, he found a small oasis, and two days later Mauro was found by nomads who took him to a military camp and then to a hospital. During this time, he lost 18 kg of weight.

3. Vesna Vulovich - a flight attendant who survived a fall from a height of 10 thousand meters

Vesna Vulovich was not supposed to be on that flight, but because her name was confused with that of another flight attendant, she ended up on board. On January 26, 1972, a Yugoslav Airlines DC-9 flew from Copenhagen to Belgrade via Zagreb. There were 28 passengers and crew members on board. At an altitude of 10,160 meters, a bomb exploded in the luggage compartment of the aircraft. Presumably it was a terrorist attack.

The aircraft crashed and crashed in the mountains, killing 27 people. The only survivor was the stewardess Vesna Vulovich, who was in the tail of the plane.

The accident resulted in a fracture of the skull, legs, three vertebrae, one of which was crushed, due to which her body was paralyzed from the waist to the legs.

Vulović spent several months in the hospital, but after the operations she was able to walk again.

Her name was included in the Guinness Book of Records as the person who survived the longest fall without a parachute.

4. Frane Selak - seven accidents, one lottery win

Croatian music teacher Frane Selak is either very lucky or very unlucky. He survived seven accidents, and he always managed to avoid death.

His adventure began in January 1962, when Selak was on a train to Dubrovnik that derailed and fell into an icy river, killing 17 passengers. The man escaped with a broken arm, minor cuts and bruises.

A year later, while Selak was flying from Zagreb to Rijeka, the plane's door suddenly opened and the passengers were blown off the plane, killing 19 people. However, Selak landed on a haystack and woke up days later in the hospital with minor injuries.

In 1966, the 3rd accident happened when he was riding a bus that crashed and fell into the river. Four people died, but Selak managed to survive again.

In 1970, Selak was driving when suddenly his car caught fire. He managed to get out of the car before the gas tank exploded. Three years later, the man's other car caught fire again, causing him to lose most of his hair.

In 1995, Selak was in Zagreb when he was hit by a bus, but again the Croat escaped with only minor injuries. IN next year, while driving on a mountain road, he avoided a collision at the last moment when a truck was driving at him. The man jumped into a tree and was able to watch his car explode 90 meters below him.

In 2003, 81-year-old Selak won £600,000 in the lottery.

5. Roy Sullivan - 7 times struck by lightning

It is said that lightning never strikes the same place twice. However, the American forester Roy Sullivan was struck by lightning 7 times, and he was able to survive.

In 1942, the first lightning struck Sullivan's leg, causing the nail on his thumb to come off. In 1969, after a second lightning strike, his eyebrows were burned, and he lost consciousness.

In 1970, a third lightning bolt resulted in a shoulder injury. In 1972, a lightning strike set his hair on fire, and he knocked over a bucket of water on himself to cool off.

In August 1973, lightning ripped off his hat and struck him on the head, his hair caught fire again, he was thrown from a truck and his left shoe was blown off.

In June 19756, the sixth lightning strike resulted in an ankle injury, and in 1977 the last lightning strike resulted in a burn to the chest and abdomen. His wife was also struck by lightning once while hanging laundry in the yard. In September 1983, Roy Sullivan died at the age of 71, having committed suicide because of unrequited love.

6. Joe Simpson - fell into an ice crevice and got out for three days

Joe Simpson was one of two British climbers who climbed the 6344-meter peak of Siula Grande in the Peruvian Andes.

The accident happened on the descent when Simpson broke his leg. His partner Simon Yates decided to tie his comrade to the cable, descending with him. But at some point, he had to cut the cable and Simpson fell down 30 meters into an ice crevice.

Surprisingly, Simpson survived the fall and crawled to the camp for three days.

Joe Simpson later wrote a book, Touching the Void, about his experience, which was made into a documentary.

7. Anatoly Bugorsky - survived after a particle accelerator beam passed through him

In 1978 Anatoly Bugorsky was a researcher at the Institute for High Energy Physics in Protvino, Moscow region. He worked with the largest Soviet particle accelerator, the U-70 proton synchrotron. On July 13, 1978, Bugorsky was checking out a faulty piece of equipment, and as he leaned towards it, a proton beam went through his head.

Bugorsky said that the flash was "brighter than a thousand suns," but he felt no pain. The radiation dose was 200,000 rad at the entrance and 300,000 rad at the exit. It was believed that a radiation dose of 500-600 rad could kill a person. Bugorsky was taken to a hospital in Moscow, where he was expected to die.

However, the scientist survived, and was even able to defend his dissertation. The incident did not affect him intellectual ability, but he has lost hearing in his left ear, and the left side of his face is motionless due to nerve damage. Bugorsky can work normally, but occasionally he has epileptic seizures.

No matter how much we wallow in technology and scientific knowledge, there are forces in the natural world that can quickly remind us how little we really control. Winter is known for not having mercy on those who underestimate it. She defeated armies, destroyed entire civilizations - and even, in some cases, changed the face of the Earth.

Yet every winter season, thousands of people tempt fate by going out into the cold without supplies, knowledge, or emergency skills. While most of these adventurers will go on with their lives as if nothing had happened, without being buried under an avalanche or frozen in the dark, there are those who are much less fortunate:

10. The dog survived the winter in Alaska

On January 22, 2004, lumberjack Greg Clark was boating off the southeast coast of Alaska with his longtime pal, Brick, a black Labrador. At 12:23 pm, Clarke sent out a distress signal, saying that his boat had hit rocks somewhere near Heceta Island. By the time help arrived, there was no sign of Clark or Brick. Searchers combed the area for three days, finding only an unused suit and parts of the wreckage of the boat.

A month later, Kevin Dau, a friend of Clark's, was on a boat ride with his father off Hecate Island. He saw an animal that at first seemed to him a wolf. However, upon closer inspection, he recognized Brick, who had somehow survived the icy water and made it to shore - where he survived sub-zero temperatures, treacherous terrain, and almost complete absence food. Kevin reported that when he called Brick, he immediately dived into the cold water and swam quickly enough to the boat, despite injury, exhaustion and illness due to long exposure to such conditions.

9. Behind the enemy line

Jan Baalsrud was a Norwegian immigrant, as well as a fighter in the sabotage and airborne detachment, and indeed tough guy, who took part in secret missions to bring supplies for the Norwegian resistance during the Nazi occupation in the Second world war. After being betrayed and surrounded German soldiers, Balsrud fought back, moreover, he managed to escape, despite the toe shot off in battle.

Lacking any supplies and being lightly dressed and without one shoe, he crossed the mountains, survived an avalanche, received numerous frostbites, but still reached a small village, the inhabitants of which accepted him.

8. The man who survived after passing the Death Zone

Beck Weathers has survived 18 hours in sub-zero temperatures in the so-called "Death Zone" of the mighty Mount Everest. He miraculously came to his senses and crawled back to the camp.

Upon his return, he was found to have corneal lacerations, hypothermia, and a severe case of frostbite which resulted in the amputation of both of his arms. His experience was the basis of Jon Krakauer's bestselling book Into Thin Air, which tells the story of an ill-fated expedition that resulted in eight deaths during the worst Everest climbing season in history.

Source 7Swedish man hibernated for two months

A 45-year-old man from southern Sweden, whose name has not been released, was found bundled up in a sleeping bag in the back seat of his car after spending 2 months on a snowy, remote forest road.

Doctors were shocked to find that he had gone so long without food, as a result of what many believe was his body adapting to the low temperature, much like a bear's body, and he went into a temporary state of hibernation. This amazing ability allowed him to live longer than any other person who found himself in a similar situation lived.

6. Donner Reed Group

The Donner-Reed Group was a group of American pioneers who traveled by train to California in 1846 and were involved in a series of accidents, making a plethora of navigational errors. These accidents forced them to spend the rest of that winter trapped in snow in the Sierra Nevada mountains. Many members of the group succumbed to adverse weather conditions, hunger and disease, some of the survivors resorted to eating their fallen comrades.

Only 48 people out of 78 survived that winter and made it to California. Since then, their sad story passed down from generation to generation - as evidence of the human will to live.

5 Colorado Man Amputates His Own Leg

On October 6, 1993, William Jeracki was fishing alone in a small creek near Denver, Colorado. Noticing ominous clouds gathering overhead, he decided it was time to head home. But just as he was about to leave, a simple oversight caused him to move a large boulder that landed right on his left foot.

Realizing that he would not be able to free his badly crushed leg, and considering the rapidly approaching blizzard, William decided to amputate his leg at the knee. With the help of a fishing line used as a tourniquet and a blunt penknife, he cut his tendons, nerves and ligaments of the patella so that his thigh slipped out of the patella. He then crawled to his car and drove to a nearby clinic, where he was airlifted to the University of Colorado Hospital.

If you've already seen the 127 Hours movie (pictured above), then you're probably thinking to yourself, "Ah, big deal - I've heard about this before." But think about this: amputating a leg is much more difficult than hand, and this guy didn't think if he should do it for a few days. He cut off his leg in less than 4 hours!

4. Anna Allen

Anna Allen and her boyfriend Frank Yeatman were about to ride down the slopes of Alpine Meadows, when suddenly a monstrous avalanche came down the mountain, destroying everything in its path.

A few hours later, Anna woke up in pitch darkness, wild cold and with a depressing headache. For a whole day, she regained consciousness and lost it, until she finally began to understand where she was and how she got here. After nearly two days of being trapped in a snow trap of frozen ruins, without food or water, she suddenly heard the screams of the rescuers repeating her name. It seemed to her that they did not hear her desperate cries.

Almost 24 hours passed before rescuers finally pulled her out of the ice and informed her that she had survived the worst disaster at a ski resort in North America.

3. Husband and wife were trapped in the snow with their infant son

In late December 1992, Jim Stolpa, his wife Jennifer, and their 5-month-old son, Clayton, found themselves walled up in their pickup truck after driving a long-distance route through the Sierra Nevada mountains. They were stranded, freezing cold and with very limited supplies. After spending four days in a cramped, snow-covered pickup truck, they decided to walk through snowdrifts as high as a grown man's thighs, as they realized that there was nowhere for them to wait for help.

After walking almost 26 kilometers, Jennifer could not continue the road, as she was exhausted. Refusing to give up, Jim found a small cave where Jennifer and Clayton could hide, while he himself moved on through the frozen wasteland in search of help. For two more days he walked through the snow, until he finally found help. He then led the rescue team back to the cave, where they found Jennifer and Clayton cold, hungry, exhausted, but alive.

2 Alpine Plane Crash

On October 13, 1972, Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571 crashed high in the Andes, killing a quarter of its 45 passengers, including the rugby team, their families and associates. Of the 29 people who survived the first few days at over 3,350 meters with meager food and water, eight more were killed by an avalanche that destroyed their makeshift shelter from the wreckage.

Deprived in this way of food and having lost all hope of salvation, the remaining people were forced to eat the frozen bodies of their relatives and friends. After a month of desperate attempts to survive, two people from a group of survivors decided to go on a journey through the harsh territory in search of help. They endured a grueling 10-day trek through the icy wilderness until they finally found the Chilean. The man fed them and informed the authorities about the location of the accident. The group of survivors was soon rescued.

1. Call from the Void: Coombs vs. Avalanche

Colby Coombs, 25 year old instructor National School training leaders in the wild was on vacation in the Alaska Range with his friends Ritt Kellogg and Tom Walter. The trio had almost completed their journey through the Pink Panther Route on Mount Foraker when a massive avalanche suddenly came down from the top of the mountain, knocking them almost 250 meters down the mountainside.

Coombs woke up six hours later, hanging from his rope. He had two fractures of the cervical vertebrae, broken shoulder blades, and a broken ankle. Recovering, he turned to his friend Walter, who was dead, his face covered in ice. The next day, as he was making his way down the mountain, despite his injuries, he found Ritt, who was also dead.

Before he was safe, Coombs fought off all thoughts of pain and loss for four days as he made the arduous descent down the mountain.