- [Narrator] When luck meets perseverance of the human spirit, the most incredible
survival stories are born. Stories that amaze us
and make us realize that, in spite of our vulnerabilities, there's a little fighter inside us ready to take control
when the road gets bumpy. Let's find out about these amazing stories that reveal inhuman amounts
of luck and unluckiness, depending on how you look at them. (happy, bouncy music) Number 10, Frank Selek. If luck's a superpower, this Croatian music
teacher definitely has it. He survived a derailed
train, a plane crash, three flaming cars, and two bus crashes. Becoming both the luckiest
and unluckiest man alive. After cheating death seven times you might have thought Selek's
luck had run it's course. But you'd be wrong. He purchased his first ever lottery ticket and won the equivalent of just over one million dollars at the time. He decided to give it all
away to family and friends, saying his health and his wife
is all he needs to be happy. But apparently, the seven accidents weren't the only disasters in his life; he also adds six previous
marriages to that list. Number nine, Tsutomu Yamaguchi. Amazingly, this man has experienced two nuclear explosions at ground zero, and survived both to tell the tale. On the 6th of August in
1945, he was in Hiroshima on a business trip when it was
nuked by an American bomber. He saw a great flash in
the sky, as it exploded three kilometers away from him. He was blown over, suffered severe burns, ruptured his eardrums, and
was temporarily blinded. He then returned home,
180 miles to the west, where he received
treatment for his wounds. His hometown Nagasaki, was then hit by the second US atomic bomb to strike Japan. Despite around 200,000 people
dying from the bombings, he's the only survivor of both bombings recognized by the government of Japan. Still, he lived to the age of 93, though he did start to suffer from radiation related ailments later in life. Number eight, Paul Templer. This man spent his
twenties as a safari guide which lead him to ending up inside of a hippo for an afternoon. That day, he was taking clients down Zimbabwe's Zambezi river,
when all of a sudden a Range Rover-sized monster-hippo of about four and a half meters long, and one and a half meters high, knocked one of his pals out of his canoe. As he paddled towards his friend, the hippo cruised towards
him, rippling the water like a torpedo cutting through the water. As he turned to grab his
friend, all of a sudden everything became dark, slimy, and smelly. He was underwater but his waist up wasn't wet like his legs were. Turns out he was head first, up to his waist in the hippo's mouth. He wriggled until the
hippo opened it's jaws wide enough for him to make an escape. But hippos are notoriously ruthless, killing more people in
Africa than any other animal. So it struck again, dragging
him back under the surface. After what felt like
ages, the hippo lurked suddenly for the surface,
spitting him out. But maybe it was because
his feet looked tastier as the hippo quickly swallowed Paul again. This time feet first. Though Paul scratched
and punched away at it, he figured that by holding
the hippo's canine tusks which were boring through him, his flesh wouldn't tear so much. That's probably what lead
to the hippo releasing him as it grew frustrated that he wasn't being ripped into a hundred different pieces. It took Paul eight agonizing
hours to get to a hospital without any painkillers
and he admitted that the pain was so intense,
he considered suicide. In the end, his arm was crushed to a pulp. He had a wound so deep,
his lung was visible. And a doctor counted 40
puncture wounds on his body. He survived and wrote
a book on the ordeal. Number seven, Matt Suter. Picture sitting on your couch
doing some channel-surfing when suddenly the floor
starts moving like jello, the wall in front of you disappears, and a 150 mile per hour tornado takes you for a nasty ride 40 meters into the air. There's no surviving a ride like that. That is unless you're, Matt Suter. In 2006, the 19 year old Missouri native was in his grandmother's trailer when a massive force hit the trailer, wrecking everything around him. Wearing only his underpants,
Matt was sucked out of the trailer into the
raging darkness beyond. By the time he regained consciousness, the twister had tossed him 400
meters away in a grass field. He broke the record for
the longest distance a human being has ever
survived being flung, a record initially held
by a nine year old girl who rode a tornado for 300 meters. Number six, Anatoli Petrovich Bugorsky. Russian scientist Anatoli
Petrovich Bugorsky is best known for
accidentally sticking his head in front of charged particles that were traveling almost
at the speed of light. He was checking a malfunctioning
piece of equipment at the U-70 Synchrotron
Particle Accelerator when the safety mechanisms failed. Although I doubt he wanted this way, experiencing and surviving that, could be considered a
contribution to science in itself. He reported seeing a flash
brighter than a thousand suns but didn't feel any pain. Still, over the next several days his face swelled up beyond recognition and started peeling
off, revealing the path that the proton beam had
burned through his face. Though he received far in excess of a fatal dose of radiation, he survived and even completed his PhD. Believe it or not the
freaky part comes just now. Looking at Bugorsky
now, you'll notice that the right half of his face has aged, while the left half looks as if it was frozen in time 22 years ago. Maybe there's something to it? Take that Botox! Number five, Harrison Okene. Some people would argue
that a bad day at sea is still better than a
good day at the office. But Harrison Okene doesn't
quite agree with that. In May 2013, Okene was
working as a cook on a tugboat moving through stormy waters
off the coast of Nigeria, where a sudden rouge wave
slammed into the vessel, and the ship began to sink. He managed to find a small pocket of air in the engineer's office,
but the boat had landed upside down on the sea floor,
300 meters below the surface. Facing a staggering
number of lethal threats, and forced to hear how his crew mates were devoured by sharks,
he'd started losing hope. Three days later, a
group of salvage divers looking for bodies, were
shocked to see a human hand waving at them through an
opening in the shipwreck. Understandably, his
miraculous rescue went viral after it was posted online. Number four, Wenseslao Moguel. Pancho Villa was a Mexican
revolutionary general and one of the most prominent figures of the Mexican revolution, even starring in Hollywood
films as himself. After his defeat by the
Constitutionalists in 1915, Northern rebels faced harsh punishments by regional de facto armies. Among his supporters was a
guy called Wenseslao Moguel who was sentenced to execution by a firing squad without trial. But Moguel had one last
card up his sleeve. He was really, really good at not dying. Despite being shot ten times, including one shot to his
head, Moguel survives. He then waited for his
executioners to leave, and miraculously left the scene
to make his way to safety, where he received medical
attention and recovered. Number three, Eric Nerhus. Eric Nerhus was diving
for abalone shellfish off Cape Howe, Sydney, with his
son and group of friends. In the ten meter deep water,
visibility was very limited but everything became more confusing when he encountered some
kind of a dark cave. Seconds later, he realized the cave was actually a Great White Shark. His head, a shoulder and arm,
were inside the shark's mouth and 3,000 teeth were
biting down on his body. When the Great White started shaking him, that's when he realized he was going to be turned into fish food. Spending about two minutes
in the shark's mouth without his air supply,
he used his abalone tool and stabbed the shark
several times in it's eye. The shark let go and circled him. After which he put his
regulator back into his mouth. He then had to slowly rise to the surface to avoid the bends when he was pulled up by his shocked teenage son, Mark. Number two, Maruo Prosperi. The Marathon Des Sables isn't considered the toughest athletic
event on Earth for nothing. The six day, 155 mile run
through the Sahara desert, leaves us mortals gasping for
air just thinking about it. In 1994, Mauro Prosperi
thought it was worth trying but part way through the event, a storm caused him to lose direction, ultimately running several
hundred kilometers into Algeria. After 36 hours, he ran
out of food and water. So he switched to a diet of bats, the occasional desert
snakes, and his own urine. Lost in one of the most
inhospitable places on Earth, he tried to slit his wrists. But the lack of water
caused his blood to thicken, and clotted the wound. He took this as a sign
that he should keep living and kept walking across the desert. On day eight he discovered an oasis. The next morning, he
bumped into some shepherds who summoned rescuers. Now before I tell you
about the most amazing tale of an incredibly
lucky/unlucky forest ranger, here are a few honorable
mentions you won't believe. To start, this guy who was lucky enough to have the common sense
to wear eye protection. What you see lodged into his safety specs is an Angle Grinder disk,
that would've almost definitely blinded him if
he wasn't a sensible human. Take this as a lesson. Wear your protective equipment. Next up, a reminder to
get your Tetanus shot. Had this rusty nail penetrated his foot, this person would've
felt pain like no other. Here is another one but this
time it went through the shoe and between his toes! Sure, a nail to the foot hurts but it's also a common
way of getting Tetanus, as rusty nails are habitat
for Tetanus bacterium. And if you've watched our video on the most painful things
people have experienced, you'll know just how painful Tetanus is. Now for the luckiest driver in the world. One driver in China
accidentally hit the accelerator instead of the break, and nearly shot off a 50 foot rooftop car park. The car perched over the
edge with just enough room for them to walk away from the
driver's near fatal mistake. Now, onto the amazing
story taking the top spot. Number one, Roy Sullivan. The probability of someone
being struck by lightning during an 80 year lifetime
is about one in 10,000. So you can understand why everyone says lightning doesn't strike twice. Everyone except this guy. Roy, a Virginia forest
ranger was apparently a natural conductor of electricity. He beat those odds seven times. In fact, this is the
odds of getting struck seven times in a lifetime like he did. I bet you don't even know
what that number is called. Those odds are one in ten octillion. Though of course, by his nature of work, the odds would be lower for, Roy. Since his work exposed him to more storms than the average person. He survived each jolt, but not unharmed. The first one only tested the waters and knocked his big toe nail off. In 1969, a second strike
burned off his eyebrows and knocked him unconscious. In 1970, another strike
left his shoulder seared. The last jolt sent him to the hospital with chest and stomach burns, but also put him in the
Guinness Book Of World Records for most lightning strikes survived. In the end, when Sullivan did pass away it was a self-inflicted bullet,
not a bolt that did him in. Reportedly, he was rejected in love but I'd say it's more likely he just had enough of Zeus's thunderbolt. So which person did you
think was the luckiest? And which ordeal would you
least like to have experienced? Let me know in the comment
section down below. And if you know of any other lucky people that should've made the list, tell me in the comments as I
may make another video on it. Thanks for watching. (psychedelic music)
