A man was hospitalized in serious condition on Wednesday after he was accidentally scooped out of a dumpster and dumped into a San Francisco garbage truck before the vehicle’s compactor was activated.
The horrifying incident unfolded shortly after 4:10 a.m. near Mason and Eddy streets, just blocks from San Francisco’s notorious Tenderloin District.
According to KTVU, the man had reportedly been digging through a commercial dumpster when a Recology driver mechanically lifted the container and emptied its contents into the back of the garbage truck.
The victim was dropped into the vehicle and buried beneath approximately 30 cubic yards of garbage.
Bystanders suddenly heard desperate screams coming from inside the truck and flagged down the driver, but the garbage compactor had already been activated at least once.
Twenty-five San Francisco firefighters rushed to the scene and began the difficult process of removing the truck’s contents by hand.
Firefighters feared that dumping the entire load onto the street could further injure or kill the man, so they painstakingly pulled apart the mountain of garbage piece by piece.
The victim remained conscious and communicated with rescuers while he was trapped.
Paramedics somehow managed to reach one of his arms through the debris and administer medication through an IV before firefighters could fully uncover him.
Video from the scene showed firefighters standing inside a massive pile of trash as they desperately searched for the buried man.
“We were thinking it was a baby because they were going so slow and doing it so carefully,” witness Freddy Diaz told KTVU.
After approximately two hours, firefighters finally pulled the victim from the truck and transported him to Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital, where he was reportedly listed in serious condition.
One firefighter also suffered a hand laceration during the dangerous rescue and required stitches.
“This is pretty unusual,” Recology spokesman Robert Reed said, adding that approximately 15 years had passed since firefighters last rescued someone from one of the company’s trucks.
Authorities had not publicly identified the man or confirmed his housing status. Officials planned to interview him at the hospital to determine why he was inside the dumpster.
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Jim Hᴏft is the founder and editor of The Gateway Pundit, one of the top conservative news outlets in America. Jim was awarded the Reed Irvine Accuracy in Media Award in 2013 and is the proud recipient of the Breitbart Award for Excellence in Online Journalism from the Americans for Prosperity Foundation in May 2016.
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