Incredible footage has been shared that shows the moment a snowboarder was saved after becoming trapped on a mountainside.
Ian Steger was out in the mountains of Washington State last month when he fell head first into a tree well. Check out the tense footage:
Trapped deep beneath the snow, and alone, he faced certain death.
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That was until skier Francis Zuber spotted him, and managed to pull him out from the depths and save his life.
It's a story that's almost too unbelievable to be true, but luckily the Good Samaritan was wearing a GoPro at the time and captured the whole thing.
In a short clip from the rescue that's been shared widely online, Francis can be seen slaloming down the wooded mountainside when he spots Ian's board poking out.
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Understandably concerned for whoever's on the other end, he races over and begins digging out the snow, desperately trying to get to the person below.
Reassuring the trapped snowboarder, Francis says: "Hold on, I'm coming!"
Eventually, he manages to shovel out enough of it that he can see Ian, who is upside down.
"Thank you," he says.
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To which Francis replies: "Yeah, no problem."
He goes on: "OK, you're good, I got you. Alright we're both gonna catch our breath for a sec, then I'm gonna help dig you out, OK?"
After he's freed, Ian is later heard telling Francis: "Thanks for that, man."
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Speaking about the incident, Ian told ABC7: "You can see in that video that Francis was asking if I was OK.
"He was letting me know he was coming up to me. I didn't hear any of that.
"It was complete darkness. I could only hear, you know, the sound of my own breathing.
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Experts have said that Ian would most likely have died if Francis hadn't come to his aid.
"One of the things that I was thinking about while I was down there was like, wow, like, I'm going to die down here," Ian said.
"And I'm not going to be able to, you know, tell my fiancée how much I love her."
Hero Francis said: "I caught this little flash of red out of the corner of my eye.
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"And I knew it was kind of a weird thing to see because we're out of bounds. I knew something was wrong. You know, I yelled up to him, and no response."
Dominic Smithers