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Abnormal Physical Strength In A Crisis (Hysterical Strength)

Also, if said chap was daydreaming or not concentrating then his body may have been very relaxed when hit (indeed his cognition may not have kicked in until after landing) - it is well known that a very relaxed body takes less injury than a very braced body. I had a drunken (and well trained) friend who fell, and I shit you not, from the 5th floor of a house onto concret. Yes, he was in great condition and yes he was more pissed than mr pissed in a pissed competition; but he did not hurt himself, had not scratches etc, and while were running down the stairs to retrieve (what we thought was going to be a body) met him coming up the stairs! Truth!
 
TheOriginalCujo said:
"I'm not sure that we become superhuman in a crisis. I think we just don't realise how strong we are untill it's really imortant.
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"

Here's a related experience, although it certainly DOES NOT involve a crisis situation.

Years ago, summertime, I lived in town at the family home while my parents and younger brother stayed at our vacation home around 20 miles away.

The bathroom shower developed a steady drip, drip, drip, quickly becoming a solid stream, that involved worn-out washers in both of the taps.

My late Dad regarded family (and even extended family) plumbing as his personal priesthood to which he ALONE had been divinely ordained. (Dad was one of the greatest men I've ever known and I am not criticising.)

"Turn off the faucets as tightly as you can with your hands," Dad said when I called him on the 'phone, "and I'll fix them the next time I'm in town. In the meantime use the tub"

When Dad returned to replace the washers he asked me why I'd used a vicegrip pliers or a wrench when he'd told me to use just my hands.

I assured him that I used my hands and nothing else.

"That's hard to believe," Dad said, "YOU TOTALLY BROKE BOTH SOLID STEEL SHAFTS INSIDE THE WALL!"

Not a crisis situation. But can you imagine what I could have done with a frozen valve if a loved one's life had depended on it?

P. S. It's worth noting that at that time I was a rather soft and bookish young man, probably even less physically active than I am these 40 years later.
 
We have all known short, thin, wiry people capable of extraordinary feats of physical strength. Where exactly does that strength come from? What IS the physiology involved?

Years ago I knew a guy who was not much more than five feet tall, weighed 95 pounds, thin as the proverbial rail and was prematurely grey. People meeting him for the very first time usually assumed that he was more than 70 years old.

He was 35 years old, in roaringly good health, extremely virile (according to numerous ladies), and could drink people three times his weight under the table.

He was also very well-known in American speological circles, since he had liquid nitrogen nerves and could fit into places his larger caving comrades could not and/or would not venture.

He could put me (at that time 208 pounds) into a bear-hug from which I could not escape and then lift me very nearly over his head.

How exactly does 95 pounds DO that?

P. S. And aside from all that he'd read his Charles Fort.
 
Whoops! Almost Forgot!

There was a woman in Newport, Kentucky (opposite Cincinnati, Ohio) around 15 years ago who saved the life of her 17-year-old son when he got crushed by the automobile he was working on. The vehicle had slipped off the jacks. I don't remember the mother's exact weight but it was less than one hundred pounds.

This event received extensive news coverage here in Greater Cincinnati, including follow-ups. It turns out that the mother suffered severe damage to her own skeletal system, which required years of surgery and therapy to alleviate.

But according to her it was all worth it.
 
I think the problem is we tend to think in purely human terms. When you consider the strength of other primates, and their genetic similarity to us (chimps are what? 98% identical to humans?), perhaps given that perspective it's not so surprising that we have reserves of latent strength. In the wild chimps routinely shift huge logs and rocks to get at termites. It's postulated that gorillas are about three times stronger again than chimps (and, if it exists, a sasquatch would be maybe five or six times stronger). Our physiology isn't all that different :).

Perhaps the difference is that humans look at something and rationalise "I couldn't lift that". Other animals don't rationalise, they just think "I need to move that". And humans, in crisis, think the self-same thing - no rationalisation involved.

Maybe it's all down to psychology and/or self-belief?
 
I think you're on to something there Stu. Years ago I was asked to clean out my employer's kitchen, which involved moving this large and very heavy combination oven. I got on with the job, lifted it and moved it to the other side of the room. My employer was astounded that I hadn't asked him for help because according to him even he had trouble lifting it and he was a large built 6 footer. I didn't put any thought into it and just did it.
 
Nah, I'm with Stu on this one. Next time I need to lift an anvil, I'm going to ask an ant. Makes sense. 8)
 
My grandad has always told me this story since I was little, and being the kind of guy who's so straight down the middle he makes anyone look dodgy, I tend to believe him.

During the war he was in Glasgow (before he joined the army). A fire broke out on the roof of the place they were staying in (apparently caused by shrapnel or something). He and his brother ran up the stairs with a sandbag in each hand, dumping them on and around the fire.

The next morning they could only carry one between them.

I wonder if the above posters are right, and my grandad and his brother moved the bags simply because they HAD to, without considering whether or not they would be able to.
 
stuneville said:
"Perhaps the difference is that humans look at something and rationalise 'I couldn't lift that'. Other animals don't rationalise, they just think 'I need to move that'. And humans, in crisis, think the self-same thing - no rationalisation involved."
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I think you're most probably correct. Around a dozen years ago I contacted several movers in an attempt to remove a large gas range from the top floor of an older apartment building I then managed. All of them said that the stove was "far too heavy to move by hand" and that I'd have to hire some sort of industrial crane to carry it out a window. (This of course begs the question of how the darn thing got into the apartment in the first place as much as 75 years earlier.)

The guy who eventually picked it up and carried it down three flights of steps to the street and then lifted it into a truck was a fellow in his early 70s - a wirey, healthy man, admittedly, who was still regularly employed as a body-rescue and salvage skin-diver on the Ohio River.
 
I remember watching an old World War Two newsreel showing American Marines moving inland onto a Japanese-held island, firing their weapons as they proceeded.

At least one of the Marines was firing a .50 caliber tripod-mounted machine gun as a SHOULDER weapon.
 
Mighty_Emperor said:
I'm sure we've all heard tales of mothers lifting cars off their children, etc. so I wonder - does this really happen? Has anyone studied this?

I did have a search of the boards but couldn't come up with anything (if there is a thread let me know and I'll merge away) and I peeked in a number of general paranormal books but couldn't spot anything.

I've always found these stories fascinating but for soem reason haven't really thought to lok them up until now.
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Could the inner strength be like what the Chinese call Chi?
 
For a brief account of a mother lifting an automobile off her trapped son, here in my own area, please see the second of my two postings from January 15, 2006, above. This Northern Kentucky event was well-covered in the Cincinnati news media when it transpired.

There were also several follow-up news accounts, because the mother (who weighed about 95 pounds) suffered SEVERE skeletal damage due to her feat. Being a mother, however, she said it was WORTH it to save her son.
 
I do believe that people have a lot more strength than they give themselves credit for. There are things that I, as a mother, have done that I have no idea how I actually accomplished.
For example, my son was in the hospital in January for surgery. He was in a crib-bed. It was a normal sized bed - actually, probably larger than a normal bed as it was more than large enough for me to sleep next to him in it. When I stood on the floor, the side parts of the crib were up to my chin or a bit above.

A few days before we were scheduled to go home, I left him alone in the bed with the sides up. When in the bed they were above his head while standing, and were supposed to be safe. Well, he wasn`t about to give up so easily and pulled himself up by the curtains on the wall side of the bed. When I got back to the room, he was dangling by his foot from a space between two bars on wall side, about to fall down onto his head.

I somehow leapt over the side of the bed, retrieved him, jumped BACK over and ran him to the nurses station. I do not remember doing this. All I know is that when I went back to the room the sides were fully raised and locked. They were a pain to unlock and lower - it took a minute or so each time and required quite a bit of skill. There was no way I could have done it and still reached him before he fell. Leaping over something at chin level isn`t exactly something I can imagine doing - especially as I`m not exactly the most physically in shape type - but I certainly must have done so.

Not quite as dramatic as lifting a car, but still a mystery of motherly power in my eyes.
 
I wonder to what extent this idea of "super strength" might be related to the apparently well-attested stories of soldiers shot during the heat of furious combat but who are completely oblivious of this fact at the time, continuing to function quite normally, and don't realize they've been wounded until they're informed of this by a buddy or even not until they get back to base later that night or the next day.
 
I think they're different effects, but both medically established. Apparently our muscles are capable of producing about 5x normal output if correctly stimulated, which only happens in extremes of when electrically tweaked. The pain thing is down to the effects of a massive dose of adrenaline.

Both looks like mechanisms which have evolved as last-ditch survival techniques. Having your muscles operate at strengths which can break or dislocate bones would be a disadvantage in everyday life, and similarly being able to ignore injuries and bleeding would be hazardous. (That's the idea with pain - it stops you damaging yourself). but in a life-or-death situation new rules kick in.
 
As a footnote, perhaps its highly significant from an evolutionary point of view that the trigger for such feats very often seems to involve a mother having to rescue her child.
 
wembley8 said:
"....being able to ignore injuries and bleeding...."
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That's supposed to be the reason for the bright red uniform jackets worn by the Lobsterbacks - so they wouldn't be disturbed by the sight of their own blood when shot or stabbed.
 
lemonpie3 said:
what's a lobsterback?
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British infantry from the late 18th and early 19th Centuries - so called from their bright red uniform jackets and hats.
 
I found this via Boing Boing:


Man lifts car off pinned cyclist
Teenager expected to survive dragging

arizona daily star
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 07.28.2006


When Tom Boyle saw a young man being dragged underneath a car on the East Side Wednesday night, his fatherly instincts kicked in.

Kyle Holtrust, 18, was riding his bike south on South Kolb Road against traffic near East 22nd Street around 8:30 p.m. when he was hit by a car, said Sgt. Decio Hopffer, a Tucson Police Department spokesman.

Holtrust became trapped under the car, along with his bike, and was dragged for about 20 to 30 feet before John Baggett, who was driving the car, came to a stop.

Boyle had just left a shopping center with his wife when they saw Holtrust underneath the Camaro, he said.

"I didn't believe what I saw," Boyle said Thursday. "I didn't believe it until my wife said something, and I was just like, 'Oh my God.' You think things like that only happen in movies."

Boyle and his wife got out of their car and ran over to the Camaro where he said he saw the front tires lifted off the ground.

Holtrust was pinned underneath his bike, which was pinned underneath the car, said Boyle, who is 6 feet 4 inches tall and weighs 300 pounds.
"As soon as I get to the car, the boy is just screaming his head off, and I could tell he was in a lot of pain," Boyle said. "As I was lifting the front end of the car off of him, he was just saying, 'Mister, mister, higher, higher.'

Then when it was high enough, he said, 'OK. I can't move. Get me out.' "
Boyle said he began yelling to Baggett to pull Holtrust out, but he didn't respond.

"I yelled at him like four or five times, and then he reached underneath and pulled him out," Boyle said. "The driver must've been in shock, and he couldn't seem to come out of it."

Once Boyle put the car down, he held Holtrust until the Tucson police and fire departments arrived, he said.

As they waited, Boyle recalled Holtrust asking what happened and having to explain to him that he was hit by the car, he said.

"That boy really impressed me with how composed he was," Boyle said. "He was pouring blood everywhere, and he kept saying he didn't want to waste anyone's time. He even said thank you to me, and that blew my mind."

Boyle, a paint-shop supervisor at Hamilton Aerospace and father of two, said he doesn't view himself as a hero.

"All I could think is, what if that was my son," he said. "I'd want someone to do the same for him, to take the time and rub his head and make him feel good until help arrived."

Added Hopffer, "It is reassuring to see people in this community who not only stopped, but also helped someone in need."

Holtrust, who was taken to University Medical Center to be treated for head and leg injuries, was not available to be interviewed. He is expected to survive.

The teenager was cited for riding without lights and riding on the wrong side of the road, Hopffer said.

Baggett, 40, who was driving the Camaro, was cited for driving on a suspended license.
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source
 
From the breaking news:

A Kansas mother is praising a neighbor as "Superman" after her 6-year-old daughter told her he somehow found the strength to lift a car off her. The girl escaped with minor injuries after she and neighbor Nick Harris said she was pinned under the vehicle.

"He really is Superman," Kristen Hough, the child's mother, said Friday of Harris, the man she said saved her daughter, Ashlyn.

Harris, 32, said he doesn't know how he managed to lift the Mercury sedan off the child. The 5-foot-7, 185-pound Harris said he tried later that day to lift other cars and couldn't.

"But somehow, adrenaline, hand of God, whatever you want to call it, I don't know how I did it," he said.

Harris was dropping off his 8-year-old daughter at school last week when he saw a driver backing her car out of a driveway and over the child, Harris said.

"I didn't even think. I ran over there as fast as I could, grabbed the rear end of the car and lifted and pushed as hard as I could to get the tire off the child," he said.

...

Hough said Ashlyn told her Harris lifted the car off her, Weingartner said.

Weingartner, the first officer at the scene, said Harris "was amped up pretty good. The first words out of his mouth were, 'I lifted the car off the girl.'"

He said it appeared Ashlyn wasn't pinned under the car long enough to be seriously hurt, Weingartner said.

Hough said her daughter was released from the hospital that afternoon with a concussion and some scrapes.

"She is my little walking miracle right now," Hough said. "He truly is a superhero in the family's eyes."
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Source
 
Man 'bends car door' of burning vehicle to save driver

A man saved a driver from a burning car by bending the door with his bare hands, say police, describing his feat of "superhuman strength".
Bob Renning, 52, pulled up on a freeway in Minnesota to help another vehicle that was filling with smoke.
He told the Minneapolis Star Tribune he was not sure how he bent the door open far enough to shatter the window glass.

Police officer Zachary Hill was first to the scene and full of praise for Mr Renning's "extraordinary" heroics.
"He did an extraordinary deed, bending a locked car door in half, of a burning car, to extricate a trapped person," said Hill.

Mr Renning, a member of the US National Guard, said he sprinted towards the vehicle as he saw flames and smoke "rolling around" the SUV. His girlfriend called 911.
After he realised the vehicle was locked and the windows would not work, Mr Renning gripped the top of the door frame with his fingers, braced his foot against the door and pulled, according to the Minnesota State Patrol.

The man in the vehicle, Michael Johannes, said he did not realise someone was trying to save him as he held his breath in the smoke-filled car.
He suffered minor smoke inhalation and light cuts from being pulled through the shattered window.
"Thirty seconds later and I would have been done," Mr Johannes said. "It was a good thing I didn't have my family in there."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-28121446

:D
 
Firstly id like to say not much has happened to me in the paranormal department,however im really interested in it,so you may find most of my stories come from family and friends and friends of friends,if you get my point.Im still finding my way around the site so please bare with me.Anyhow this is a storie told to me by my father about a great aunt during the second world war.One night during the war the there was a german bombing campaign on the docks area of Sunderland(well known for ship building).My great aunt was watching my father and his two cousins at her place,mid evening there was an air siren going off that signalled another german bombing raid.My father was in a upstairs bedroom with his two cousins and one of them started to sob uncontrolably has the bombs started crashing down,his aunt heard the crying and ran up the stairs to the bedroom.When she started to assure them all everything was okay his cousin still wouldnt stop sobbing,suddenly there was a bomb that exploded less than a quarter of a mile away,my dad says his aunt suddenly grabbed a wardrobe that weighed a ton and moved it in lighting speed against the bedroom door.Why she did that is unknown(fear panic probably)but my dad says my aunt weighed no more than 8 stone ringing wet and the wardrobe was an old wooden thing about 7ft tall and 5ft wide very heavy has he remembers.Do you think theres something inside that gives us extra when were very frightened,strength wise???BTW the wardrobe wasnt on wheels!!
 
This is a well known phenomenon.
The theory behind it is that we can suddenly get a boost of adrenalin that makes our muscles perform at their peak.
There's a story in the Guinness Book of Records about a hysterical woman who lifted a railway car off her son after an accident, possibly making that the most spectacular feat of this kind.
 
I remember reading about a mother who lifted a crashed car up so her kid could escape a while back but can't remember any more details.
 
Stan Lee said he was inspired by hearing of such an event to create the Hulk. Though as mentioned, I'm not sure anyone has ever documented such an event or found someone who saw it first hand.
 
kamalktk said:
It's interesting that something for which there is apparently only anecdotal evidence is accepted as factual by science.
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Unfortunately, there is no easy way to replicate this on demand under test conditions.
However, medical scientists do know that adrenalin alone can increase muscular efficiency and improve blood circulation. It's not that much of a stretch to believe it.
 
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