In 2003, Aron Ralston was on a solo climbing trip in Canyonlands National Park when an 800-pound boulder fell from above him.
The next thing he knew, his right arm was lodged between the boulder and a canyon wall. Quite literally caught between a rock and a hard place, Ralston was also trapped 100 feet below the desert surface and 20 miles away from the road.
Though he had enough provisions to get him through a few days, Ralston was forced to drink his urine after he ran out of food. Convinced that he was going to die, he recorded goodbye messages to his loved ones on his video camera.
He even carved his epitaph into the canyon wall so that people would know when he passed away. But then, Ralston fell asleep and had a dream in which he saw himself with one arm. So after he woke up, he broke his arm and amputated it using a cheap, two-inch knife — in a grueling process that took an hour.
