A DAD who died for six minutes after his head was crushed by a concrete block has told how his friends held his skull together to keep him alive.
Mike Wolo, 52, was working when a 10,000lb slab of stone fell onto him – squashing his face to just three inches wide and blowing one of his eyes out of its socket.
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He was left so disfigured that pals couldn’t find his mouth to perform CPR and witnesses said his head resembled a “mushroom ready to erupt”.
Mike’s lifeless body hung limp as he was pinned against the wall for six terrifying minutes.
Frantic bystanders tried to find a way to free the dad-of-two – but time was running out and his heart had stopped beating.
Mike, from Massachusetts, was 32 at the time of the horror accident and was working as a kitchen designer.
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His friend worked transporting trucks of granite and would sometimes call him and ask him to help out as a favour.
He initially refused the offer and only turned up last minute, assuring himself it would be the last time.
Although he knew the task was dangerous, Mike never expected he would end up resembling a “Walking Dead Cast Member” and nearly being decapitated.
He spoke to The Sun about the nightmare ordeal and his long road to recovery.
Mike was working inside an open trailer – with the huge concrete slab sitting nearby waiting to be moved by a crane operator.
Before it had even lifted off the ground, Mike heard his friend cry out and, confused, he began to run towards the exit of the container.
But it was too late and the concrete block fell and crushed his head against the wall.
For Mike, everything went black – and it was now the task of his friends to try and save his life.
He told The Sun: “They realised they had to get me breathing again. But I had no mouth.
“They said everything was just sideways, and they could see inside my skull and whatnot.
“Three or four of them started taking turns holding my skull together.
“They said that the blood was just gushing out so quickly. So they were just trying to hold it all together and kind of put the parts where they’re supposed to be.”
He added: “It just crushed everything, the only thing that saved it from cutting the rest of my head off was a piece of wood.”
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Still fighting for his life, Mike was airlifted to hospital and his family were told to “say their goodbyes” as he was given just a two per cent chance of survival by the surgeon.
Mike’s injuries were so severe the paramedics viewed him as “an organ donor” and were dumbfounded when he later went to visit them in person and thank them for saving his life.
Talking about the extent of the damage he said: “It hit me on my left temple, and then ripped my full face off down to just under three inches wide.”
As Mike’s devastated family prepared to bid him farewell while he lay unconscious in a coma, he recalled having a strange dream.
He explained how a work colleague had died suddenly months earlier and appeared in front of him sitting on a log.
The colleague told Mike it “wasn’t his time” and asked him to check up on his family for him.
And shortly after, against all the odds, Mike woke up writhing in agony.
He described feeling “horrific pain,” and added: “There’s no words to describe what you’re feeling except for your entire body is screaming, it’s the most ridiculous pain.”
He recalls not being able to see as one of his eyes “blew out of the head” and his face was so swollen it was “larger than a soccer ball or basketball”.
Mike’s mouth was wired shut and he was unable to speak or eat normally, relying on a tracheotomy tube to breathe.
Three or four of them start taking turns holding my skull together.They said that the blood was just gushing out so quickly
Mike Wolo
His mother was so afraid of how he would react if he saw his reflection that she tried to stop anyone showing him.
Mike said: “You’d watch people stare at you and looked horrified.”
“I remember the first time I saw myself in the mirror that you know the absolute horror of seeing how big and gigantic my head was, but it was also not symmetrical.
“It was very misshapen and pointy at the top, and my left side was more stretched out than the right.
“And one eye, my left eye, that blew out of my head was, you know, put back in, but it’s it’s moving on its own. It’s not moving to where I’m trying to look.
“In my right eye, all the blood vessels looked like a demon’s blood, a red eye.
Although Mike was awake, he was not out of the woods yet and diced with death two further times during his hospital stay.
These came when his breathing tube became blocked and he began to choke on his own blood.
One of these terrifying experiences came while Mike was asleep and a “crazy” drug-induced dream meant it was actor Will Ferrell who woke him up and saved his life.
He described being in a car where a man in a suit was trying to choke him and he was “losing the battle”.
Mike said: “Out of nowhere Will Ferrell starts pounding on the glass of my window screaming at me to wake up.”
After three major reconstructive surgeries and four weeks bed-bound, Mike was able to leave the hospital and had only one thing on his mind.
It hit me on my left temple, and then ripped my full face off down to just under 3 inches wide
Mike Wolo
He went to the ambulance station to surprise the crew who saved his life worked and revealed he “scared the heck out of them”.
Mike said when they heard news he was alive, they thought it was a Halloween prank.
“I looked horrible like a Walking Dead cast member with a brace on and a trach tube hole,” he explained.
Once out of hospital Mike still had the mental side of his trauma to grapple with and experienced crippling anxiety and depression.
He added that he had to stop work for a “couple of years” and felt like “a burden on society”.
“Mentally I was traumatised. It took me eight years to feel secure in my new face,” Mike said.
Despite the horrific ordeal, he didn’t let anything stand in the way of his love for the outdoors and was back on a snowmobile just three months after his accident.
He also discovered a passion for football at age 40 and was invited to join the local semi-pro team to get back in shape after he gained “a bunch of weight”.
Mike completed two full seasons with them before he retired.
He said despite immense suffering and unbearable pain, he wouldn’t change a thing about the accident.
“It gave me the pathway that I was supposed to be on, ” he said.
“I’m a better person. I embrace life more. I look at things differently. I absolutely have no regrets.”
Mike attributes much of his strength in the aftermath to a sense of humour and self acceptance as well as a “tremendous support system” and “wonderful neighbours”.
It has now been more than 20 years since the freak accident in 2003 and Mike is now happily married with two kids.
He works in telecommunications but is hoping to inspire others through motivational speaking and has set up his own website.
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