How did you spend Christmas Eve? Was it at an awkward family gathering? Scrambling to buy last minute gifts? No matter how stressful it was for you, Robert Schoff has got it beat: he spent it trapped upside down in a full septic tank!
The 77-year-old Des Moines, Iowa man began his holiday with a toilet problem. So he went out to his septic tank and tried to remove the clog. Instead, it removed him. The senior lost his balance and fell into the slop, with his head trapped inside and his feet kicking wildly in the air. The 5'5", 135-lbs. man tried yelling for help at the top of his lungs but no one heard him.
He stayed that way for about an hour unable to escape his smelly predicament until his wife began to wonder where her husband disappeared to. [...]
Eventually 911 and fire officials rushed to the scene and pulled him to safety. A long shower followed. "I thought it was the end of my life," he reflects. "Thank God my wife saw me. I don't think I could have stood staying in there much more."
Afterwards, Robert said that "It was the worst Christmas Eve" he's ever had. And that's no bull: http://www.citynews.ca/news/news_18026.aspx
I get the joyous task of checking the tank on a regular basis at the cottage, and I can tell ya that even standing 6 foot above the opening, it's still enough to knock ya on your arse, so I can only imagine how bad it was to be IN the tank.