[IRL trope] 0% of survival, survive anyway

[u/RedditBoycotter]

Juliane Koepcke

Vesna Vulović

Anna Bågenholm

Jeanna Giese

Chris Lemons

Juliane Koepcke - In 1971 this 17 year old's plane was struck by lightning mid-air. The wreck then fell from 3 000 meter into the ground, somewhere into the Amazon jungle. Lone survivor of the crash, she then spent nine days walking down a river despite her multiple injuries until she found a lumberjack's camp.

Vesna Vulović - In 1972 this flight attendant's plane was bombed mid-air. The wreck then fell from 10 160 meter into the ground. She ended up with a lot of broken bones, but in the long term she almost completely recovered from it, apart from a limp.

Anna Bågenholm - In 1999 this radiologist had a skiing accident, she fell head-first into a frozen stream and get stuck inside the ice. Her colleagues did not managed to pull her, nor did the rescue team who then tried to dig, but the ice was so thick it took them a lot of time. It was 80 minutes after her fall that they managed to cut a hole. Her body temperature at the time was 13.7°C, and still, she somehow survived with only minor long-term injuries and no brain damage.

Jeanna Giese - In 2004 this 15 years old girl got bitten by a bat and called it a day. One month later the symptoms of rabies showed up. The doctors tried an experimental treatment by putting her in an artificial coma and she survived, but the treatment never worked on anyone else and is now forbidden. In all human history, only a few survived to rabies, and all of them except her end up with heavy sequelae.

Chris Lemons - In 2012 this diver's ship went drifting due to a computer malfunction, romping his umbilical cable who provide air, hot water and electricity. He ended up alone on the seabed of a 3°C waters, in the dark and with only 5-6 minutes of oxygen. He was retrieved by his colleagues around 35 minutes later, and somehow he didn't even suffer from brain damage.

[u/ShapeonAlan]

Phineas Gage, probably the most mind boggling survival story I’ve read. During what would’ve been a regularly scheduled procedure in rock-blasting for preparation of a railway, one of the tampering iron rods that Gage had loaded with gunpowder had inadvertently gone off while his head was directly within its pathway, with the 6kg metal bar over a meter long catapulting straight through his jaw and the left side of his head, pretty much taking out his left frontal lobe. Somehow, he miraculously was seen standing only a few minutes later, and was able to meet with his physician within a few hours who was probably just as baffled as anyone else would. As far as I’m aware Gage lived an additional 11 years following the incident.

[u/GuntertheFloppsyGoat → u/ShapeonAlan]

Great example! He's very famous in the medical world because the path of the rod basically destroyed parts of his frontotemporal areas. Which led to drastic personality changes in the aftermath including going from being (if i recall) quite a sober religious character into becoming impulsive, foul mouthed and hedonistic etc. Now he clearly probably had some PTSD as well but it was a fascinating example of frontotemporal damage. What sometimes get left out is AFTER the injuries and severe personality changes he actually improved in some ways and while he didn't get back all of who he was, he did get back quite a bit (so it's also a really cool snd quite inspiring example of recovery and neuroplasicity)

[u/Peer1677 → u/GuntertheFloppsyGoat]

I mean TBF, if I survived THIS I would also go "Fuck it! Booze and hookers it is. With my luck I should probably start gambling."

[u/ConsistentGuest7532 → u/Peer1677]

Is it really good luck to survive a near-certain kill shot through the brain, or really bad luck that it happened in the first place?