(Minghui.org) I am a heavy-duty truck driver. If Master Li hadn’t saved me, I would have lost my life in an accident long ago.

It was December 2010. As usual, I was driving my 10-wheeler truck filled with iron powder back from Liaoning Province. In the middle of the night, it started to snow. Flakes as large as goose feathers fell thick and fast, blurring my vision, and I had to turn on the windshield wipers.

The snow fell thicker and faster until a 25-centimeter-thick (about 10 inches) layer of snow covered the road, and it was getting slipperier and slipperier. My truck weighs 22 tons, and I was hauling 66 tons of iron powder.

I had to go through a high mountain pass, where I have to drive very carefully. In this kind of weather and road conditions, it’s particularly dangerous.

I called my boss ahead of time to explain the situation, hoping I could wait until the snow let up a bit before going on. He wouldn’t hear of it, insisting that I make it back without fail so as not to delay the next day’s cargo pickup.

So I had to keep going. Just seven or eight meters (about 25 feet) from the crest of the mountain, all 10 wheels began to lose traction. I told my co-driver, Xiaopang, to quickly get out and find something to prop against the wheels, though I also worried that if there was an accident, he wouldn’t be able to escape.

As soon as Xiaopang jumped out, the truck began to slide backward. It was already too late for me to jump out. There was a concrete guardrail along the cliffside with posts over 20 centimeters (about eight inches) thick. But that couldn’t stop 88 tons.

After smashing through six of the posts, the rear of the vehicle plunged over the edge, and the front end tilted upward. With no time to escape, I could only scream, “Master, save me!” As the front end dropped and the vehicle began to tumble, my head repeatedly slammed against the roof of the cab. Instinctively, I clung to the steering wheel with a death grip, pressing my body against it as sheer terror consumed me. The truck rolled and crashed all the way to the bottom of the cliff.

When the vehicle finally came to a halt, I was hanging upside down in the cab with my foot wedged against the clutch. A tree branch about 10 centimeters (about four inches) in diameter had smashed straight through the windshield, passing just centimeters from my head and extending all the way to the sleeping bunk behind the driver’s seat.

Accident photos taken by the traffic police later revealed the extent of the wreckage: the vehicle was a total loss, with the rear bodywork scattered in pieces all over the ground. The doors were mangled. Because the windshield was laminated—meaning it would crack but not shatter—I was spared from being injured by the glass.

I was panicking, afraid the truck would roll over, crash, and catch fire. But my foot was pinned and I was hanging upside down, trapped in the mangled cab, unable to move a muscle. If a fire broke out, I’d burn to death right there.

Just as I was in utter despair, I suddenly heard Xiaopang shouting my name: “Gangzi, are you still alive?!” He called out to me, his voice choked with tears as he ran. Because the cliff was so steep, Xiaopang had to take a long detour to get down to where I’d landed.

From inside, I shouted, “Hurry and clear the windshield! Help me pull my foot out from under the clutch!” Hearing my voice, Xiaopang quickly smashed the glass with his elbow and tried to pull me out, but my foot was pinned and wouldn’t budge. I told Xiaopang to grab my arm and lift me, which allowed me to free my foot. Only after I scrambled out of the truck—half rolling, half crawling—did I finally breathe a sigh of relief. But my foot was injured, so I couldn’t use it.

Just then, a passing truck driver noticed the damaged guardrail and realized there had been an accident. He and his assistant made their way down to the foot of the cliff, where the three of them helped me up to the road. The driver then took me to the county hospital. An MRI scan revealed multiple sites of intracranial hemorrhage, including an 8x10 mm blood clot on the brainstem. The doctors recommended a craniotomy. By this time, I had already lost consciousness.

While waiting for my boss, I regained consciousness and found myself lying on a bench in the hallway. My first thought was, “I practice Dafa; I’ll be fine. I need to get home right away.” Just then, my boss arrived.

The doctor recommended a craniotomy but noted that it was a very risky procedure. I adamantly refused the surgery due to the danger. My children were still in school, and my wife wouldn’t be able to care for me after the surgery. Unable to sway me, my boss agreed to drive me back to the city.

When I lapsed into unconsciousness again on the drive, my boss gripped my hand tightly, fearing I wouldn’t wake up, while Xiaopang shouted, “Brother, don’t fall asleep—if you do, you might never wake up!” I drifted back into unconsciousness. When I came to, I found myself lying in the neurosurgery emergency room on the fourth floor of the municipal hospital.

The doctor took another X-ray and said, “You must undergo a craniotomy. You have intracranial hemorrhage—it’s still bleeding. We don’t even know if you’ll make it off the operating table, but without surgery, you won’t survive.”

At that moment, I knew I had to hold firm to my faith in Dafa and refuse the surgery. My boss was terrified and at a loss for what to do. I told him, “I am a cultivator; I’ll be fine. Just take me home—I won’t try to extort money from you.” He didn’t believe me and said, “You’d better have the surgery. I’ll pay for it.” With that, he walked out.

I remembered what Master said:

“We have said that good or bad comes from a person’s initial thought, and the thought at that moment can bring about different consequences.” (Lecture Four, Zhuan Falun)

I rolled off the hospital bed onto the floor. My foot was injured and so swollen that I couldn’t stand, and I was too weak to reach the elevator buttons, so I had to crawl down the stairs.

When the boss returned after settling the bill and found me missing, he took the elevator down but couldn’t find me; he went back up to the fourth floor—still nothing—and took the elevator down again, only to discover I had already crawled all the way to the ground floor.

I told him, “You bear no responsibility for whatever consequences may follow.” Seeing how determined I was, he drove me home.

When I got home, my wife was frightened. She asked me through her tears, “What’s wrong?” I said, “Don’t be afraid. Just make up the bed for me—I’ll be fine after a good night’s sleep. Just help me recite, ‘Falun Dafa is good, Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance is good.’” My wife nodded, still crying.

I slept from 6:30 a.m. until the next day, a total of 24 hours! I felt completely awake. My multiple broken ribs and my foot were still throbbing slightly, but my mind was crystal clear, so I sat up and began doing the exercises. Within a month, I had fully recovered.

My boss, my coworkers, and my close family members have all witnessed the wonders of Falun Dafa, as well as its extraordinary nature and greatness. As a result, my boss’s entire family and all my coworkers have taken up the practice.

Thank you, Dafa!Thank you, Master, for saving my life!