He Was Dead 20 Minutes, Then: 'We're Bringing Him Back'

Michael Pruitt was at a construction site in metro Detroit with his stepdad when the metal ladder he was carrying touched a live wire. The 20-year-old was electrocuted and the homeowner called 911 and started CPR, but by the time Pruitt arrived at the hospital, the situation was dire. "They brought in this perfect young man who had no vital signs," the ER doctor who attended to Pruitt tells WXYZ. "I said to my team, ‘We’re bringing him back.’ And then, I said to him, ‘You better come back!'" After two shocks from a defibrillator, Pruitt, who had been clinically dead for 20 minutes, did just that.

A nurse says "he was like the Hulk" when he regained consciousness, "grabbing the railings and shaking the bed with huge strength. ... I guess every superhero has to die at least once." Pruitt was recently reunited with the medical team who saved his life. The director of trauma services at the hospital tells Fox 2 his survival is "miraculous," and says that because CPR was done continuously, he did not lose any brain function. His big toes, however, were burned from the inside when the electricity exited his body; they're healing, but Pruitt jokes that he's currently using them as an excuse to avoid having to take the garbage out at home. He adds, to the Oakland Press: "When people ask if my hair spikes naturally, now I tell them it’s because I was electrocuted." (More uplifting news stories.)