Man trapped in garbage truck shouts himself to safety

Last Updated: Monday, November 14, 2005 | 5:02 PM ET

CBC News

A man has been freed after being trapped in a garbage truck for more than an hour.

The 45-year-old was in a disposal bin on Monday morning when a city garbage truck came along and emptied the bin into its hold, police spokesperson Olivier Lapointe said.

City workers were driving along when they heard shouting coming from the truck. They pulled over to the side of the road and called police.

Crushed

Michel Duval, who was driving the garbage truck, heard yelling from the hold of his truck as he was about to drop another dumpster load.

Duval says he had probably dumped a couple of loads on top of the man before realizing he was inside.

Duval compacts each load before adding another.

Firefighters eventually pried open the garbage portion of the truck and, after pulling out piles of trash, managed to dig the man out of the truck, Lapointe said.

Fire Chief Gilles Ducharme says the man is lucky he survived the crushing of the garbage.

"We had pieces of wood, steel bars, so he was lucky that none of those passed through his body," Ducharme says.

The man was likely sleeping in a dumpster that got emptied into the truck, Ducharme figures.

The man was put on a stretcher and placed in an ambulance at about 7:30 a.m. at the corner of Cote-des-Neiges and Kent.

He was wearing bright red socks, and dark pants. He was moving his hands as he lay on the stretcher.

Sleeping outdoors

Most homeless people in Montreal do sleep in shelters, but some do choose to stay outdoors, says James Hughes of the Old Brewery Mission.

"That is often connected with a mental health issue or a very severe social issue, but one way or the other, it's frankly very sad," Hughes said Monday morning.

Urgences Santé officials say the man's leg was broken in two places, and it is believed he also has a broken pelvis. He also suffered internal bleeding because of the pressure from being compacted in the truck.