Back in 2014, an Australian man nearly lost his life after being involved in a serious motorcycle accident, if it wasn’t for an Iron Maiden t-shirt.
Steve Radeski crashed his motorcycle that lead to the loss of his right leg. His injuries caused him to lose so much blood that his chances of survival were brought down to a matter of minutes. “My leg had come off totally and the bones were coming out of my hand. It was a compound fracture of the femur so that took the femoral artery out,” said Radeski.
But a passerby named Bill Gaythwaite, who had returned from Afghanistan was there to save Radeski’s life thanks to his favorite Iron Maiden t-shirt. “There was no one around and a returned soldier from Afghanistan turned up after he heard the accident,” Radeski explained.
“I only had about six minutes to live and he came up after about four minutes and he was wearing a 1985 Iron Maiden tour shirt which he’d had since he was a kid. He was a tragic fan but looked at me and realized that he would have to use it as a tourniquet which stemmed the blood flow until the helicopter arrived,” said Radeski. “Iron Maiden saved my life.”
But Radeski was able to repay Gaythwaite’s kind deed after his story reached Iron Maiden‘s management team by rewarding him with a brand new Iron Maiden t-shirt signed by the band, as well as a spare for him to wear. Gaythwaite has also since received an award and commendations from the police and army for his heroism.
To this day, Radeski still has the t-shirt that saved his life, “and it hasn’t been washed,” he joked.ÊÊÊ