Photo: Cadillac
A 75-year-old man from Cleveland, Ohio, went through a genuine ordeal when he became trapped in his beloved 2006 Cadillac XLR roadster at the end of August, and spent 14 hours inside thinking he was about to die from exhaustion.
Peter Pyros went inside his garage where the car was, thinking he would take it for one last spin with its top down before autumn. He got inside the car and shut the door, only to find that there was no power to the engine. Without power, the doors, the honk and even the top became inoperable.
The Cadillac has a manual emergency release lever situated on the floor next to the seat, but Pyros didn’t know that because the owner manual was inside the house and he hadn’t read it carefully. He also had no way of contacting anyone, since he’d left his phone inside.
Pyros lives alone and his neighbors were out to work that day. He spent 14 hours in the hot car, with temperatures soaring above 100 degrees. He passed out twice from exhaustion and he even managed to scribble a note to his relatives, to let them know what had happened, lest they think he committed suicide.
Just as he was starting to make peace with the idea that he was dying, his neighbor came back. He had tried to call Pyros and was worried that he got no answer, Pyros tells USA Today. He then heard a muffled sound and some banging, which was Pyros trying to knock out the window with his last strength.
The neighbor called 911 and rescuers were eventually able to free the man. They couldn’t open the door with their crowbars, so they had him pop the hood so they could jump-start the engine, which also opened the door.
Pyros is now looking into his options, in order to take action against General Motors. His attorney tells the publication that burying a line about the manual release lever in the owner’s manual is not enough, as GM should have included some sort of warning stickers inside the car as well.
“GM’s mechanical door releases provide a reliable backup in the event of a power failure,” GM spokesman Tom Wilkinson tells USA Today in a statement.
That’s not enough for Pyros, though. He survived cancer and 9 surgeries, but this ordeal has been the most taxing for him, he claims.
“I’m having a hard time. I wake up and think I’m in the car. I cry now when I say my prayers because I don’t know why I was so lucky to live,” he says. “I wouldn’t want my worst enemy to go through one thousandth of what I went through. You can’t describe it… you’re dying, you’re dying.”
In 2015, a 72-year-old man and his dog did die from exhaustion, after becoming trapped in the man’s Corvette in a parking lot in Texas.
The Cadillac has a manual emergency release lever situated on the floor next to the seat, but Pyros didn’t know that because the owner manual was inside the house and he hadn’t read it carefully. He also had no way of contacting anyone, since he’d left his phone inside.
Pyros lives alone and his neighbors were out to work that day. He spent 14 hours in the hot car, with temperatures soaring above 100 degrees. He passed out twice from exhaustion and he even managed to scribble a note to his relatives, to let them know what had happened, lest they think he committed suicide.
Just as he was starting to make peace with the idea that he was dying, his neighbor came back. He had tried to call Pyros and was worried that he got no answer, Pyros tells USA Today. He then heard a muffled sound and some banging, which was Pyros trying to knock out the window with his last strength.
The neighbor called 911 and rescuers were eventually able to free the man. They couldn’t open the door with their crowbars, so they had him pop the hood so they could jump-start the engine, which also opened the door.
Pyros is now looking into his options, in order to take action against General Motors. His attorney tells the publication that burying a line about the manual release lever in the owner’s manual is not enough, as GM should have included some sort of warning stickers inside the car as well.
“GM’s mechanical door releases provide a reliable backup in the event of a power failure,” GM spokesman Tom Wilkinson tells USA Today in a statement.
That’s not enough for Pyros, though. He survived cancer and 9 surgeries, but this ordeal has been the most taxing for him, he claims.
“I’m having a hard time. I wake up and think I’m in the car. I cry now when I say my prayers because I don’t know why I was so lucky to live,” he says. “I wouldn’t want my worst enemy to go through one thousandth of what I went through. You can’t describe it… you’re dying, you’re dying.”
In 2015, a 72-year-old man and his dog did die from exhaustion, after becoming trapped in the man’s Corvette in a parking lot in Texas.
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