Jess Battison
Warning: this article contains graphic images that some readers may find distressing.
Your first day at a new job can always be a nervy one, choosing what you’re going to wear, where you’re going to sit and just hoping you don’t end up embarrassing yourself.
But the last thing you probably consider is the chance of you having a freak accident. And sadly for this man, he ended up losing both his legs just minutes into his first day.
It was a ‘miracle’ John O’Neill survived after taking on a job as a tree worker in Colorado, US. The 33-year-old had been fitted with a court-ordered ankle monitor and reportedly ended up being the thing that got him in trouble.
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Just 15 minutes into the workday, the Denver Post reports how he was throwing branches into a woodchipper, leading to him getting caught in it himself.
O’Neill had grabbed a branch with a fishhook shape to it and chucked it into the machine, but the end of it caught his tracking device, dragging his leg with it.
Then, horrifically, the spinning blades of the woodchipper began slicing away at his toes, foot, ankle and legs.
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While the man’s co-workers were around doing their jobs, no one could hear him screaming for help at first as they were all wearing ear protectors.
“It took a minute before my coworkers realised what was happening,” he said.
Fearing for his life as the machine blades continued to spin, O’Neill began to fear the worst.
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“Something happened in my brain to where I realised I was in fear for a lot more than just losing my leg or my foot,” the man said.
“The pain was very — it was not there almost. I didn’t really feel the pain as much as I knew I was in trouble. It went from a fight for my limb to a fight for my life, very fast.”
He tried to stay as calm as possible, hoping to keep his heart-rate down as a co-worker managed to pull him out as the blade got to his mid-thighs.
During a helicopter ride to the hospital, he says he ‘technically died’ as his heart stopped and ended up having the remainder of his legs amputated, needing 15 pints of blood.
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“They essentially replaced all the blood in my body,” O’Neill explained.
“It’s beyond a miracle that John is still with us, and he’s fighting harder than ever,” his friend George Safir wrote on GoFundMe.
“Our friend has always been pretty reckless and living life on the edge! All while doing so, being a warrior in life.”
O’Neill has been volunteering with non-profit the Phoenix, which helps those battling addiction as he leads rock climbing and CrossFit events.
O’Neill is 'crushing his recovery faster than anyone’ as Safir added: “John has very high spirits and is ready to get back to some rock climbing.”