Jeremy Renner opened up about his life-threatening snow plow accident in his first interview since the incident, Jeremy Renner: The Diane Sawyer Interview — A Story of Terror, Survival and Triumph, which aired Thursday on ABC.
The Avengers and Hawkeye star detailed the January 1 incident, recalling that he used his 14,330-pound Sno-Cat to help his nephew, Alex pull a truck out of the snow. After successfully freeing the vehicle, Renner’s plow began to slide on the ice. He stuck one foot out of the plow to look back at Alex, neglecting to set the parking brake, which caused him to lose his footing and fall out of the cab.
Renner attempted to jump back into the Sno-Cat, but ended up under the vehicle.
“You shouldn’t be outside the vehicle when you’re operating it…It’s like driving a car with one foot out of the car,” Renner said. “…And it’s my mistake, and I paid for it.”
Meanwhile, Alex summoned Rich Kovach and Barb Fletcher, the second of whom remembered Renner letting out loud moans, which he described as “the sound of someone that was dying.”
“I really feel he did pass away for a couple seconds. I really do,” he added.
Renner’s injuries were so serious that he wrote a goodbye note to his family in the hospital. “I’m writing down notes in my phone to — last words to my family,” Renner said through tears. “Don’t let me live on tubes on a machine, if my existence is going to be on drugs and painkillers, let me go now.”
“I have no regrets. I’d do it again,” Renner insisted. “That is a man that I’m proud of, because I wouldn’t let that happen to my nephew.”
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