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    Reader's Digest Magazine
    Knowledge

    Survival Stories

    In times of struggle and strife, humanity always finds a way. When the the clock runs low and the chips are down, these unbelieavable stories of survival will remind you of the strength of the human spirit.

    illustration of car flying off road into an embankment

    This Woman Was Trapped in Her Car on an Embankment for Days Before Concerned Neighbors Found Her

    Trapped in her car down an embankment, Corine began to lose hope of being found.

    13 Powerful Things Surviving a Terrorist Attack Taught Me About Life

    Here's how I learned to see the good in a world that can seem, at...

    Twists of Fate That Saved These People’s Lives on 9/11

    These stories will leave you speechless.

    I Survived 9/11—These Are the 15 Questions Young People Ask Me the Most

    Twelve-years-old at the time of the attack, the author survived, and so did her family....

    After a Horrible Car Crash, Her Odds of Survival Were Just 100 to One

    A car crash left Molei Wright functionally decapitated. Even if her body survived, her mind...

    This Man Broke 15 Bones When He Fell into a Glacier—Here’s How He Survived

    He knew that if he couldn't climb out, that crack in the ice would become...

    How This Quadriplegic Man Learned How to Move His Limbs…with His Mind

    Ian Burkhart was the first quadriplegic to regain control of his body using his thoughts.

    How I Escaped from Cuba in 1969 in the Wheel Well of a Jet

    This RD classic from 50 years ago tells the thrilling story of a teen who...

    When 20 Miners Became Stranded in an Elevator Shaft, One Man Transported Them All to Safety

    Below the trapped miners was an empty elevator shaft, 2,000 feet deep. Only the strength...

    How a Boy Scout Nearly Drowned to Fight Racism in His Troop

    One Moth storyteller explains the courage it took to accomplish what no one thought he...
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    5 Split-Second Decisions People Made That Saved Their Own Lives

    Kidnapped at gunpoint? Cornered by a mountain lion? Stranded in a snowstorm? These everyday people...

    This 92-Year-Old Man Was Still an Accomplished Hiker—But Then He Went Missing

    It wasn’t the first time Bill McDonnell had blazed his own trail in the wilderness....

    In a Freak Accident, This Woman Was Shot in the Neck with an Arrow and It Ended Up Saving Her Life

    After a backyard accident 
almost kills her, a Texas woman is taken 
on a miraculous...

    This Man Beheaded a Snake—And It Still Bit Him

    When Jeremy Sutcliffe decapitated the poisonous rattler threatening his wife, he assumed that would be...

    When This Farmer’s Leg Got Caught in an Auger, He Grabbed a Pocketknife and Did the Unthinkable to Survive

    With his leg caught in the sharp, whirling teeth of a gigantic corn conveyor and...
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    A 17-Year-Old Stepped In to Save a Choking Boy When No One Else Could

    Tyra Winters was participating in her homecoming parade when she saw a child choking in...

    25 Years After the Oklahoma City Bombing, the Stories of Rescue Will Still Bring You to Tears

    It has been 25 years since a truck bomb ripped through a federal 
office building...

    How Being a Girl Scout Saved My Life

    Their tight-knit Buddy System was a literal life-saver.
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    His Parachute Got Stuck on the Plane’s Wheel and He Was Suspended in Midair with Little Chance of Survival—Then Another Plane Came to His Rescue

    Almost 80 years after it unfolded in the sky over San Diego, a nearly impossible...

    After Getting Stranded at the Top of a Waterfall, These Rafters Were Saved After Sending a Message in a Bottle Over the Falls

    It was a long shot... but it worked.

    The Chilling Story of a Wolf That Tore Into a Family’s Tent During the Night

    "Backing out was a wolf, dragging something in his teeth. That thing was a man."

    After a Skewer Impaled This Young Boy in the Face, Doctors Didn’t Know How He Was Still Alive

    The skewer that impaled 
Xavier Cunningham 
below his eye must 
have sliced 
into vital arteries....

    5 People Whose Brain Injuries Gave Them New Abilities

    The brain is a powerful organ! Although these people experienced trauma, their brains compensated with...