“We’re not invincible.” That’s how Orlando Bloom summed up a life lesson he learned the hard way long before he was a household name. And he’s not alone. Many stars have had terrifying brushes with death that could have ended their stories before the spotlight ever found them.
These aren’t the scripted red carpet flash and the stunts. They’re raw, real-life childhood and teenage episodes moments that scarred, molded fear, and, in a few instances, utterly changed the way these future stars perceived the world. From accidental mishaps to violent altercations, each tale serves as a reminder that survival can be as much an accident as it is a testament to strength.
Here’s a glimpse at the terrifying experiences these celebrities had prior to fame, and how they’ve continued those moments in strong ways.
1. Adam Devine’s Cement Truck Crash
At the age of 11, Adam Devine was walking to pick up candy with friends when a miscommunication became disastrous. Having heard a friend shout “Come on!” he had walked into the street directly into the path of a cement mixer. The collision was so violent it flung him 500 feet, and during the next two years, he underwent 25 operations and had restricted mobility.
He explained to Entertainment Weekly later, “They say the reason I lived was the bike absorbed the impact first. I still skidded 500 feet. Picked me up under the first two wheels and then spit me out.” That traumatic experience in childhood didn’t only scar him physically it instilled in him a profound gratitude for second chances.
2. Tina Fey’s Childhood Attack
When Tina Fey was five, a stranger jumped her in her own front yard, slashing her face and leaving a lip-to-cheek scar. Though the event might have shaped her, Fey says she coped without dwelling on it.
“It’s impossible to discuss it without somehow apparently taking advantage of it and anthropologizing it,” she said to Vanity Fair. “I went on without knowing. I was a very self-assured little girl.” Her capacity for compartmentalization of the trauma might have been an early indicator of the strength that would eventually benefit her in comedy and Hollywood.
3. Jennifer Aniston’s Poolside Drowning Trauma
As a young girl, Jennifer Aniston was riding a tricycle alongside a pool when she fell in still holding onto the handlebars. She couldn’t let go and sank to the bottom before being rescued by her brother. She developed a permanent fear of being submerged.
“I can’t swim underwater and nobody’s going to believe me,” she explained to E! News. That fear even extended to the sets of movies, and water scenes became an emotional barrier many years later.
4. Sharon Stone Struck by Lightning
Before Sharon Stone became a Hollywood legend, she encountered nature’s raw power as a teenager. While refilling her family’s well on the iron, lightning hit the water source and sent a shock through the faucet. The pressure hurled her across the kitchen into the fridge.
“I was picked up and hurled across the kitchen Luckily my mum belted me round the face and brought me to,” she once recounted. It was one of many close calls in her life, each contributing to her reputation as a survivor of the extraordinary.
5. Liam Hemsworth’s Surfing Entanglement
Surfing was a part of Liam Hemsworth’s everyday life while growing up in Australia. But a lesson came close to ending it. As he explained to Men’s Health, a wipeout had wrapped his leg rope around his body underwater. He couldn’t surface even in waist-high water.
“The fear of dying? That’s part of the fun of it,” he confessed. Nevertheless, that day’s near-miss served as a healthy reminder of the ocean’s power.
6. George Lucas’s Racing Wreck
George Lucas loved car racing in his teen years until an accident nearly took his life. A friend, attempting to pass at high speed while Lucas made a left turn, plowed into Lucas’s car. It rolled over several times, tossing him out and breaking bones and crushing his lungs.
“Once you’ve gone over the edge and you realize what’s on the other side, it changes your perspective,” he said afterward. That shift in perspective took him away from racing and down the path that would ultimately produce Star Wars.
7. Orlando Bloom’s Three-Story Fall
In 1998, a then-21-year-old Orlando Bloom was ascending to a roof terrace when the drainpipe he was holding snapped. He fell three stories, breaking his spine and risking lifelong paralysis.
“Four days I wrestled with the reality of living in a wheelchair for the remainder of my life,” he remembered. Three months later, he was riding a bike again thankful each day for limbs that still bore him.
8. Chad Michael Murray’s Hidden Internal Bleeding
At 15, Chad Michael Murray was hospitalized with twisted intestines, but doctors didn’t realize he was bleeding internally. His athletic build masked the swelling, and it took a nurse going “against the grain” to give him life-saving blood transfusions.
“I came close to death. They had a priest standing at the foot of my bed,” he explained to The Jess Cagle Show. It was also the first and only time he’d ever seen his dad cry a moment that put everything into perspective.
9. Rachel Bilson’s Coma Following Car Crash
At age 16, Rachel Bilson was involved in a head-on crash with a truck on the Pacific Coast Highway. The force of the impact was so strong that rescuers had to extract her from the vehicle, and she lay in a coma for a few days.
Everyone was lucky to have survived,” she said to the Mirror. It left her with long-term migraines and memory loss, a secret inheritance of a night that might have ended far more horribly.
These tales aren’t only sensational they’re reminders that life is fragile, even for the seemingly invulnerable today. Every one of these stars departed from experiences that might have cut short their futures, with scars, with fears, and an appreciation for the lives they eventually created. Survival was their first and greatest triumph before the fame, the premieres, and the awards.
