Dead Body Apparently Saves Hearse Driver Who Crashed and Was Left Teetering on Snowy Colorado Cliff

The driver said the weight of the body he was transporting for organ donation kept his vehicle from going into a canyon after a January crash

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A dead body being transported for organ donation earlier this year may have unexpectedly saved a life after a hearse came dangerously close to going over a cliff.

Summit Fire & EMS said a man was driving a hearse down Interstate 70 around 3 a.m. on Jan. 27, when the vehicle went off the road near mile marker 212 between Silverthorne and the Eisenhower Tunnel, according to FOX affiliate KDVR and VailDaily.com.

Video from the scene, obtained by CBS affiliate KCNC-TV, shows the hearse hanging halfway off the snow-covered roadway. One responding officer sounded very surprised that the situation wasn't worse. "That's a lucky mother*****r right there," he said while trudging toward the vehicle through the snow.

The driver later told KCNC-TV that the weight of the body he was transporting may have helped prevent the car from falling over the edge.

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The hearse driver, who works for Hubbard and Son's funeral home service, claimed he was run off the road by a red Dodge Durango as they approached the Eisenhower Tunnel that Friday night, according to KCNC-TV.

In one clip from the footage released by KCNC-TV, the young driver of the car can be heard recounting his experience over the phone.

"They literally bounced me all the way over to the cliff," the young man said during the conversation. "I was like teetering, and then when I, like, opened my ... eyes, I was like 'Holy f**k' and I was coughing like crazy 'cause there was smoke everywhere."

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The driver escaped unscathed, and declined medical treatment, according to KCNC-TV.

"OK, file this one under: 'You'll never believe it,'" Summit Fire and EMS wrote in a now-deleted Facebook post addressing the crash, according to KDVR.

"If the 'passenger' hadn't already been dead, this surely would have done it," they later added.