Injured man saved by fast-food sauce packets

CHARLESTON, West Virginia (AP) -- A man trapped for nearly a week in his car after it plunged into a ravine survived in the freezing cold by burning paper, melting snow for water and eating packets of fast-food sauce, rescuers say.

Robert Ward, 32, suffered a broken hip in the crash and could not get out of the car. He was found Sunday by his friend Terry Likens, captain of the fire department where Ward is a volunteer emergency medical technician.

"I don't think he would have made it through the night," Likens said. "He told us when we found him, he said he was getting ready to go to sleep for the last time. He had just about given up."

Ward was in serious condition after surgery Sunday at a hospital in Huntington. Both of his feet were frostbitten.

Ward was five miles from the coal mine where he works as a security guard and two miles from the nearest home when his car went off the road December 2. It plunged 150 feet and hit a tree, destroying the headlights and horn.

The area's first major snowfall hit a few days later and temperatures remained below freezing for several days. To stay warm, Ward ripped the lining from the car's roof and used it as a blanket, Likens said.

He also burned paper, including pages from his EMT manual, and melted snow to drink. His only food was what he could get out of an old peanut butter jar and sauce packets from Taco Bell.

"It's a bachelor vehicle. It catches a little bit of everything," Likens said.

Searchers from two volunteer fire departments, law enforcement agencies, state natural resource and forestry workers and coal mine employees scoured the area. A coal company donated a helicopter for the search.

As Likens and a companion searched the ravine Sunday with binoculars, Ward heard their car and voices and started hollering.

"He asked us to pinch him so he knew he wasn't dreaming," Likens said. "He said he had a lot of weird dreams while he was down there. He dreamed two or three times when people would come by and didn't get him out."