James Valentine was 21 years old and wearing a harness when the chainsaw kicked back into his own body.
It happened in Ross Township, near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, on a Monday in 2014. The blade was lodged between his neck and shoulder, hanging from the flesh while he remained strapped high up in a tree. He did not pass out. He did not panic. He switched off the machine, held it with his own hand so it would not move a single millimeter, and began descending under his own power until a colleague climbed up to help him.
On the ground, the paramedics made a key decision: they removed the motor but left the blade in his neck, because taking it out right there could have cost him his life through blood loss. At Allegheny General Hospital, surgeons discovered something that sounded like a miracle: the blade had not touched any artery or major blood vessel, only muscle. Valentine came out of surgery conscious the entire time, with a story his own doctors described as pure luck.
