14 DAY TRIAL // Over the weekend, on Saturday, thrill-seeker Antony Britton of West Yorkshire, UK, tried to pull a Houdini and emerge victorious from a grave inside which he had his team bury him alive and with handcuffs on his hands.
Unfortunately, the stunt didn't go quite as planned. Not by a long shot. The man came dangerously close to dying and had to be rescued by his team. He did make it on the news though, albeit no thanks to his skills in escapology.
Antony Britton lost consciousness in the ground
The escapologist had his collaborators bury him in a grave about 6 feet (1.8 meters) deep. As mentioned, he also had them restrain him using handcuffs.
Since Antony Britton chose a local festival as the perfect scene for the stunt, he didn't exactly lack audience for what was supposed to be his most daring escape attempt yet.
About 9 minutes after having buried him alive, however, the escapologist's team realized that there was no way brave Antony Britton was going to make it out of the grave all on his own.
They got to work digging him up. When they got to him, the man was unconscious. He had soil in his mouth and in his throat. To save his life, paramedics first cleaned his airways and then administered him oxygen.
A few minutes later, Antony Britton came to his senses. DM tells us that, while trying to dig his way back to the surface, the man cracked one of his ribs and also suffered some scratches.
“I almost died. I was just seconds away from death. It was scary. The pressure of the soil was crushing around me,” the escapologist confessed in an interview after the failed stunt.
“Even when I found an air pocket, when I exhaled the soil around me was crushing me even more. I could feel myself losing consciousness and there was nothing I could do,” he added.
At least it was all for a good cause
The festival during which Antony Britton nearly lost his life while trying to escape being buried alive was organized by a non-profit started by the escapologist and a few of his buddies to raise funds for a leukemia and lymphoma charity.
Hence the event's name: Escape for Life. Antony Britton might not have managed to outdo Houdini and pull himself out of a grave while handcuffed, but the event was quite a hit.
