His truck was crushed into a three-foot space between two semi-trucks. The driver of one of them walked over, expecting to find a body. Instead, he heard a calm voice say: “I’m okay. I just can’t get out.”
It was just before 5 a.m. on January 17, 2015.
Kaleb Whitby, 27, a farmer from Tri-Cities, Washington, was driving through thick fog and black ice on Interstate 84 east of Baker City, Oregon, TikTok — heading to Idaho to pick up a load of cattle.
He never made it.
A semi jackknifed in front of him on the slick road. Whitby couldn’t stop in time. He swerved, hit the trailer’s back end, and his Chevy Silverado flipped around so that the passenger side was now facing oncoming traffic.
His truck stalled.
He couldn’t move.
And then he saw the headlights of another semi coming straight at him.
He closed his eyes, held on to his steering wheel tight, and prayed as the second semi slammed into his truck.
When the dust settled, his Chevrolet Silverado had been flattened into a three-foot-wide space between two 18-wheeler semi-trucks.
Sergi Karplyuk — the driver of the semi that had just slammed into Whitby — climbed down from his cab and walked toward the wreckage. He was sure he was going to find a horribly mutilated body.
Instead, he found Kaleb Whitby — alive, calm, and slightly confused about why he couldn’t open his door.
“He said, ‘Yeah, I just can’t get out.’ I said, ‘You can feel your arms and legs?’ He said, ‘I feel fine. I’m just squished and can’t get out.'”
Karplyuk asked Whitby’s permission to take a photo.
Whitby said sure.
Whitby had already cut his own seatbelt with a pocketknife and told himself to stay calm while he waited for rescue. Springer Within 15 minutes he had been cut free.
Karplyuk looked at him and said: “I’m looking at him, and I’m like, ‘Wow, this is a miracle.’ I said, ‘You were born again today, man.'”
When reporters asked Kaleb about his injuries, he didn’t miss a beat.
“I’ve got two Band-Aids on my right ring finger. And a little bit of ice on my left eye.”
Then he helped other injured drivers at the scene before heading home.
To his pregnant wife and 2-year-old son.
“Thank God that I’m still alive,” he told The Oregonian. “Now I’ve got to go figure out why. How many people don’t get the chance — a second chance — at escaping a situation like that?”
Twelve people were hospitalized that morning. Four in critical condition.
Kaleb Whitby walked away with two Band-Aids.
Some days the universe makes absolutely no sense.
And some days that is the most beautiful thing in the world.
