A man was left to hang upside-down and impaled on a fence for five days, he has revealed.
Dale Whitehurst, 44, believed that he was going to die in the horrifying accident.
Dale, from the West Midlands, now uses a wheelchair and has prosthetic legs. He thought that his "number was up" as he desperately cried out for help for approximately 112 hours, Birmingham Live reports.
As the temperature rose in the summer, Dale was plagued by hallucinations. And yet, he miraculously survived the ordeal.
Dale got lost while walking home in Stoke-on-Trent in June 2021. He attempted to take a shortcut over a seven-foot security fence, however, he slipped and jagged spikes sliced through both of his ankles.
“As I slipped, my jeans ended up around my ankles and cut the blood flow off to my feet and I smashed my head, which knocked me out,”
“When I woke I was upside down impaled and could not feel my legs. I could see my mobile but it was out of reach. I tried to free myself but the pain was unreal and my jeans just twisted tighter around my ankles.”
“I could hear people walking by and I screamed for help but no one came,” he said, adding: “The first day it was agony, I was in and out of consciousness.
"The second day I couldn’t really feel them. And I tried pulling myself up and my hands were all cut to ribbons from trying to pull myself up. I just couldn’t, every time I tried the pain just knocked me out again.”
He was rescued eventually on day five, adding: “All of a sudden three lads appeared and one ran to get help, and one ran to get me water and one stayed with me.
"The doctor was standing over me saying he’s going to cut my legs off and I was arguing with him, and then I passed out.
"I had oxygen trapped inside every organ and they had never come across a person with these injuries before.
"I survived five days hanging upside down, no food, no water and as far as I know I am the only person in the world to have survived something like this for that amount of time.”
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