'Fayetteville Observer' Carrier Suffers Gouging Ordeal on His Route

By: E&P Staff If you think your carriers have it bad, at least none of them have recently been impaled while making their deliveries.

Kevin Williams, a newspaper carrier for The Fayetteville (N.C.) Observer, got himself impaled on a wrought-iron fence for more than two hours on Monday, according to police.

Williams, 51, told WRAL-TV in Fayetteville that he mistakenly threw a bundle of papers into an alley on his route at about 3 a.m., and scaled the fence to retrieve them. While he made it over the fence with no problem, when he tried to climb back over again a spike atop the fence gouged his left calf -- and he found himself hanging upside-down, bleeding and alone in the early dark hours of the morning.

"On a scale from one to 10 -- 10 being the worst pain -- it was about a 10," Williams told WRAL. "Blood just kept running out of that the whole time I was there." He used his belt to keep his head elevated, and finally was able to pull his calf free after about 90 minutes. But his right foot remained stuck in the fence.

"I was scared, and I was praying that I don't want to die this way," he said. "I wasn't panicking. I was just concerned that nobody would come around."

A passerby heard Williams? cries for help at about 5:30 a.m., called 911 and gave him some water while waiting for paramedics. Williams told WRAL he severed two arteries in his leg and lost about a quart of blood during the accident, and required 16 stitches to close the gash in his leg.

Williams, who has delivered newspapers for nine years, added that he plans to continue once he recovers, but "Next time I lose a paper, it' s just lost.?