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Lucky Escapes

The women may have been fare-dodging.
 
IamSundog said:
How come I never get attacked by six women in miniskirts?

How often do you visit Essex?
 
Flying axe narrowly misses car passenger on US motorway
An axe fell from a landscaper's dump truck and through the windscreen of a car in Massachusetts
By Mark Molloy
4:39PM BST 31 Jul 2014

A motorist and passenger had a narrow escape when an axe flew through the windscreen of a car.
The male driver, who has not been identified by police, was on a busy motorway in Massachusetts when the tool smashed through the front passenger side of his vehicle.
A female passenger was left "shaken up" by the incident but escaped unhurt, a spokesman for Massachusetts State Police said.

The axe bounced out of a landscaper’s dump truck at around 11am on Wednesday, the police agency added.
“Thankfully, the axe only went halfway through the windshield,” Massachusetts State Police explained in a Facebook post.
“The man whose car was struck was obeying the speed limit, driving about 65mph.
“If he had been speeding, the increased velocity of his car would have increased the power of the axe's impact, meaning it could very well have gone through the glass and injured his passenger.”

The driver of the truck was fined $200 (£120) for failing to secure the axe.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... orway.html

Pic is one for the album! ;)
 
Grandfather falls from glider after mid-air crash - and lands in path of combine harvester
Glider pilot leaps from cockpit after wing breaks off in mid-air collision – only to land in front of a combine harvester
By Tom Whitehead
2:55PM BST 01 Aug 2014

A grandfather had to jump from a glider at 4,500 feet after it had a wing smashed off in a terrifying mid-air collision - only to parachute down in to the path of a combine harvester. :shock:

Dramatic images showed farmer Andy Preston plummeting to earth before he opened his parachute as debris fell around him.
His £30,000 glider was tipped upside down in the incident and he had to let himself fall from the inverted cockpit.
And seconds later, the 70-year-old landed in a wheat field right in front of a combine harvester and had to frantically drag himself away as it “screamed” past.

Mr Preston, who has been gliding for 20 years, escaped with a cut leg and fractured vertebrate following the accident and has told how he is lucky to be alive.
He had his 10-year-old parachute checked and repacked just a week before the incident.

The drama unfolded when a second glider collided with his during a competition in Cambridgeshire.
Mr Preston told the Telegraph: “I was banking. It was a very good thermal and I was climbing at approximately 500 feet a minute.

“I did not see the other person who hit me until he had hit me. He came from the side. Who knows what happened, there was no blame involved. It was just one of those things.
“I was tipped upside down and I knew I was in trouble. Luckily I was at 4,500 feet so I had time. I realised I had to get out so I did what was necessary.
“I released the canopy and released my seat belt and because I was upside down I just fell out.
“I was too busy trying to save my life to fear for it. I did all the right things and I was mightily relieved.”

He added: “What was quite daunting was that bits of the glider were falling around me but luckily I was not hit by any of them.
“I had just had the parachute checked and repacked the week before just to make sure it was all in good order. I’m glad I did.” 8)

But if he thought the drama was over, Mr Preston added: “I landed in a wheat field and looked up and there was a combine harvester coming towards me.
“I pulled myself and the parachute 15 feet to the side and it went steaming by me. I don’t know if he hadn’t seen me or was just being bloody minded.

Mr Preston, who hosts a reggae festival on his farm in Milton Keynes, said he is still to decide whether he will get back in the air.

The pilots were taking part in the week-long Hus Bos Challenge Cup when the accident happened on Saturday afternoon.

Martin Boss, who took the images from his garden, said: "There were about half a dozen to eight gliders and I took some pictures of them. Then two of them touched each other, one of the wings came off, and it went straight down."

The British Gliding Association is investigating the incident.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstop ... crash.html

I expect the combine harvester was on autopilot, and the driver was playing games on his mobile... :evil:
 
rynner2 said:
“I pulled myself and the parachute 15 feet to the side and it went steaming by me. I don’t know if he hadn’t seen me or was just being bloody minded.

You may be on to something Rynner. Unless the driver was in shock having been nearly landed on by a parachutist?

which must be a pretty surreal experience.
 
Don't combines and tractors work on some sort of GPS nowadays? I may have made that up.
 
You mean like a Driverless Car or a lawn mower robot? :shock:
 
Yeah, something to do with it keeping the lines straighter?

I may have dreamt it.
 
I think that too Carlos. I think it was on an episode of Autumn Watch or similar, where there are two 'farming machines' working in tandem, one harvesting and stripping and one collecting grain. If they don't run parallel, the grain is wasted, so GPS is used to keep them in tandem.

Or we are sharing false memories.

:shock:
 
Well, research some links for this, and you'll have something to post on the new Farmers' thread! But I'm sure we're all correct, and modern farming machinery is very high tech nowadays.

But I wonder what the 'driver' of the Combine would have thought if he had - er - 'processed' poor Mr. Preston? :shock:
 
CarlosTheDJ said:
Don't combines and tractors work on some sort of GPS nowadays? I may have made that up.

How did farmers do it in the old days?
 
ramonmercado said:
CarlosTheDJ said:
Don't combines and tractors work on some sort of GPS nowadays? I may have made that up.
How did farmers do it in the old days?
Just like old-time sailors - by using the Mk.I eyeball!

(But at least farmers didn't have to allow for cross-tides!)
 
rynner2 said:
ramonmercado said:
CarlosTheDJ said:
Don't combines and tractors work on some sort of GPS nowadays? I may have made that up.
How did farmers do it in the old days?
Just like old-time sailors - by using the Mk.I eyeball!

(But at least farmers didn't have to allow for cross-tides!)

Unless their fields were flooded.
 
I was taught to plough (with a horse!) the same way I was taught to sail a dinghy (no horse present!).

You look at something and steer for it.

My literallism meant that this rule of thumb had to be adjusted to make sure that object chosen was

* not moving
* in the right direction
* a distance away

Otherwise you end up steering by the head of the person trying to teach you. Which doesn't work so well, I can say, backed up with empirical evidence :lol:

The horse seemed to know what it was doing but the dinghy had very fixed ideas of its own that didn't include heading for where the picnic was.
 
CarlosTheDJ said:
Don't combines and tractors work on some sort of GPS nowadays? I may have made that up.
We can find out this evening:

Countryfile
Cornwall
Today on BBC1 South West from 7:00pm to 8:00pm
...
Adam takes the keys of a massive new combine harvester. :D
...
 
rynner2 said:
Countryfile
Cornwall
Today on BBC1 South West from 7:00pm to 8:00pm
...
Adam takes the keys of a massive new combine harvester. :D
...
Well, that was an anti-climax! We saw the beast, but only from the outside, and the technical talk did not include the electronics. :evil:
 
Look at the pictures of the wreckage - how could anyone survive that?

House in Southampton destroyed by 'gas explosion'

A four-year-old girl and her father have been pulled alive from the rubble of a house destroyed by a suspected gas explosion early in the morning.
The blast completely destroyed the end-of-terrace house in the Shirley area of Southampton at about 01:30 GMT.
Neighbours in Howards Grove rescued the 36-year-old man and his daughter.
They were taken to Southampton General Hospital to be treated for non-life-threatening injuries but both have since been discharged.

The little girl is due to be reunited with her mother, who was at work at the time of the blast.

Steve Buchanan-Lee, station manager with Hampshire Fire and Rescue Service, said: "It's quite a scene - the fact that the people who were inside the property had been rescued by local residents prior to our arrival is nothing short of a miracle."

Four other houses were evacuated and other properties had their windows blown out.
Firefighters worked to ensure there was no further collapse of the building.

An exclusion zone is in place while engineers from Southern Gas Networks and Southampton City Council investigate the cause of the explosion.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hampshire-30092439

EDIT: Another report, with more pics:

http://www.dailyecho.co.uk/news/1160787 ... e/?ref=trn
 
Southampton house gas blast: Dad talks 'miracle' survival
[Video: Jay Sabanal: "Daddy, can you help me? That's all I could hear"]

A father has said it was a "miracle" he and his four-year-old daughter survived a gas explosion that destroyed their home.
Jay Sabanal, 36, and his daughter, Bella, were asleep when the blast happened at their end-of-terrace house in Shirley, Southampton, at 01:30 GMT.
He told BBC News: "It is really a miracle, maybe a guardian angel."

The pair, rescued by neighbours in Howards Grove, escaped with cuts and bruises.
They were taken to Southampton General Hospital and later discharged.

Mr Sabanal said: "We were asleep and then all I heard was an explosion.
"I thought it was a dream at first and then I heard my daughter screaming, shouting for me. 'Daddy can you help me' is all I can hear from her."

Bella said: "We just went to sleep but the explosion was very loud when I just woke up.
"Our Christmas tree is broken." :shock:

Mr Sabanal's wife, Liberty, was at work at the time of the blast.
She said: "I don't care about the house, because the house can be replaced, but my family won't be replaced. Bella is my only child."


Hampshire Fire and Rescue Service said it was a suspected gas explosion.
Steve Buchanan-Lee, station manager, said: "It's quite a scene - the fact that the people who were inside the property had been rescued by local residents prior to our arrival is nothing short of a miracle."
Four other houses were evacuated and other properties had their windows blown out.

An exclusion zone is in place while engineers from Southern Gas Networks (SGN) and Southampton City Council investigate the cause of the explosion.
A SGN spokesman said engineers had isolated the gas supply to the property and supplies to other properties were unaffected.

Satvir Kaur, Southampton City Council's cabinet member for communities, said emergency shelter had been provided to evacuated residents.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hampshire-30105352
 
[Video}

Serbian minister hit by giant ice chunk escapes injury

Serbia's energy minister escaped serious injury on Thursday when he was hit on the head by a heavy chunk of ice which split his protective helmet.
Aleksandar Antic was touring an eastern area hit by a recent cold snap when the block of ice fell from an overhead power line.

Power was restored to some 5,000 people in the municipality of Majdanpek later in the day.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-30344349

If it had missed his helmet, it might have broken his shoulder. :shock:
 
He kept his cool. Ice-cool, in fact.
 

This guy had a lucky escape.

A man searching for his wallet in a bin in northern California was scooped up by a rubbish truck and taken on a long ride.

The Oroville Mercury Register reports that the man survived the ride in the rear of a garbage truck. His name was not released. Yolo County Sheriff’s Lt Martin Torres said the man got struck in the truck when it made a pick-up last Tuesday. The truck was headed to a landfill. Torres said the man told police he was stuck in the truck for about an hour.

The man used lumber in the truck to reach the top of the rubbish pile and avoid the compactor. The man was taken to UC Davis Medical Center with back and neck pain.

http://www.irishexaminer.com/world/...-at-war-over-beauty-queens-selfie-307836.html
 
23 January 2015 Last updated at 17:56
Birmingham manhole explosion: Mother describes 'miracle' escape
[Video: Sanele Mhlanga said she was "feeling very blessed"]


The mother of a two-year-old girl said it is "a miracle" she escaped injury when a manhole on a Birmingham street exploded.
The blast happened at 12:21 GMT on Thursday at Warwick Road, Tyseley, as Sanele Mhlanga and her daughter, Karen, were passing.
"She didn't have a scratch. I'm feeling very blessed - she's my precious girl," Mrs Mhlanga said.
A gas leak has been ruled out as the cause by National Grid.

Video footage posted by West Midlands Fire and Rescue shows Mrs Mhlanga and her daughter walking past the manhole immediately before the explosion.
Mrs Mhlanga, who lives in Aston with her family, said: "I was just calling Karen to come towards me and the next thing I just froze and thought 'my God, what's happening'.
"[The thought of] losing my only daughter was really quite shocking - it's a miracle I'm still holding her like this."

Masood Mushtaq owns the shop whose CCTV camera captured the explosion.
He said there had been another explosion in the same manhole nine months before.
"Everybody is just worried now. Will they get it fixed, will they find the cause?"

John Hemming, the Liberal Democrat MP for Birmingham Yardley, is also concerned the cause of the explosions has not been identified.
"We really do need to know what caused this because we don't know where else is risky," he said.

National Grid said their gas emergency service was called to an explosion in a BT cable box.
Its engineers found "no gas escape in or around the box" and said they were continuing routine investigations on the gas pipes in the vicinity.

BT has confirmed there was an explosion in one of its manholes.
"There is no evidence to suggest that this explosion was caused by BT equipment but of course specialist engineers will continue to conduct a thorough investigation," a spokeswoman said.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-30954980
 
An underwired bra saved a woman’s life after she was struck near the heart by a stray bullet.

Globo television network says Ivete Medeiros, a shopkeeper in the Amazonian city of Belem, was hit after she heard a commotion and emerged from a market to investigate. A thief holding up a passerby on the other side of the street opened fire, and a bullet struck Medeiros under her left breast. ...

http://www.irishexaminer.com/world/...-heart-makes-a-clean-breast-of-it-311224.html
 
Sleeping it off

USA: Authorities in Florida say a man and woman who were intoxicated had to be rescued after falling asleep in a dumpster that was later emptied into a garbage truck.

Hillsborough County police say the couple had been sleeping in a dumpster outside a convenience store near Tampa early yesterday. When the dumpster was emptied into the back of the garbage truck, they started screaming and banging on the sides of the truck. ...

http://www.irishexaminer.com/world/...chocs-out-as-romance-goes-hi-tech-312140.html
 
A Dutch honeymooner has become the first person to survive a fall from the 4,000ft World's End cliff in Sri Lanka.

Mamitho Lendas, 35, was taking a photograph of his new bride when he took a step backwards and plunged off the cliff.

But rather than dropping to the bottom, his fall was broken by a tree about 130ft down the rock face. ...

http://news.sky.com/story/1431822/honeymooner-survives-fall-from-4000ft-cliff
 
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