Source: Xinhuanet

02-27-2007 08:15

BEIJING, Feb. 26 (Xinhuanet) -- American Olympic wrestling champion Rulon Gardner might want to consider staying away from modes of transportation that use engines after the small plane in which he was a passenger crashed into Lake Powell, Utah, Saturday.

Gardner and pilot Randy Brooks and his brother, Leslie Brooks, were rescued by a fisherman Sunday after surviving the crash of a Cirrus SR 22 and swimming more than an hour in 44-degree( 7℃) water before reaching shore. They then spent the night without shelter, according to a news release.

"The plane went from 150 mph to none in about 2 seconds," Gardner told CNN early Monday morning.

The plane was flying low when it struck the water and all three men were able to get out of the plane before it sank.

"It takes only about 30 minutes for someone swimming in 44 degree water to start suffering the effects of hypothermia, so the fact that they swam in it for an hour, not to mention surviving the plane crash and the night without fire or shelter, is pretty amazing," said Steven Luckesen, a district ranger at Glen Canyon National Recreation Area. "If these guys were a cat with nine lives, they just used up three of them."

This is not the first time, Gardner has survived a life-threatening accident. In 2002, he became stranded while snowmobiling in the Wyoming wilderness and lost one of his toes to frostbite. Then in 2004, he was struck by an automobile while riding a motorcycle.

Gardner pulled one of the most stunning upsets in Olympic history at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, winning the gold medal in Greco-Roman wrestling by ending Alexander Karelin’s 13-year international winning streak. In 2004 in Athens, Gardner won the bronze medal, and in wrestling tradition, left his shoes on the mat as a symbolic way of announcing his retirement.

Gardner and the Brooks called a relative to take them to American Fork for medical attention.

The cause of the crash is still under investigation, said Becki Bronson, public information officer for Garfield County.

 

Editor:Liu Fang