127 Hours — Aron Ralston, the Man Who Had to Cut Off His Own Arm

He Told No One

On Saturday morning, April 26, 2003, 27-year-old Aron Ralston drove to Bluejohn Canyon near Canyonlands National Park in Utah. He went alone. A mechanical engineer who had left Intel to pursue climbing full-time, Ralston had already summited all 55 of Colorado's 14,000-foot peaks.

But that day he made one mistake: he told no one where he was going.

The Boulder

At approximately 2:45 p.m., Ralston was descending a narrow slot canyon — barely three feet wide — when a large chockstone shifted. As he grabbed it to lower himself, the 800-pound boulder slid and crushed his right hand and wrist against the canyon wall.

His hand was completely pinned. One arm under the rock, the rest of his body dangling. He pushed, pulled, chipped at the rock. It didn't move.

His gear: one liter of water, two energy bars, a cheap multitool, a low-quality video camera. No rope, no cell phone, and no one on Earth who knew where he was.

Five Days

Ralston began recording himself on the video camera.

Day 1 (Saturday). Attempted to move the boulder by every means possible. No result. Rationed water carefully.

Day 2 (Sunday). Water at half. Nighttime temperatures dropped below freezing. In shorts and a t-shirt, he stood through the night because sleeping might mean death.

Day 3 (Monday). Water nearly gone. Tried to chip the rock with the dull multitool blade — barely scratched it. Began accepting he might die. Recorded goodbye messages to his family.

Day 4 (Tuesday). Water gone. Dehydration and hypothermia setting in. Hallucinations began. He drank his own urine.

Day 5 (Wednesday morning). Hour 127. Ralston looked at his trapped arm. It had lost all sensation. The tissue was dying.

Then he realized: if he couldn't cut through the rock, he would have to cut through his arm.

The Decision

Ralston understood he needed to break the bones first. Using his body weight as leverage, he twisted his forearm until both the radius and ulna snapped.

Then, with the dull blade of his cheap multitool — not a scalpel, not a razor, but a small, chipped knife — he began cutting through his own arm. Skin, muscle, tendons, arteries, nerves. It took approximately one hour.

He later described it:

"When I cut through the nerve, it felt like electricity shooting through my entire arm. But it was also the feeling of freedom."

Walking Out

After the amputation, it wasn't over. Ralston rappelled one-armed down a 60-foot cliff face, then hiked 8 miles through the desert to the trailhead — in 100°F heat, bleeding from his severed arm.

He encountered a Dutch family on the trail who gave him water and Oreo cookies. When the rescue helicopter arrived, Ralston was conscious.

At the hospital, he had lost 25% of his blood volume and body weight. Minutes more and he would not have survived.

After 127 Hours

Losing his arm did not stop Aron Ralston from climbing.

In 2005, he completed a solo winter ascent of all 55 Colorado 14ers with a prosthetic arm — a first in history
In 2004, he published Between a Rock and a Hard Place
In 2010, Danny Boyle directed 127 Hours, starring James Franco, who earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor

When a rescue team returned to the canyon to retrieve the boulder, his hand was still underneath it.

What 127 Hours Taught

Ralston often says in his talks:

"That boulder was the best thing that ever happened to me. In those 127 hours, I learned what I truly wanted: to live."

His one mistake — telling no one — created 127 hours of suffering. But the decision he made inside those hours showed what a human being is capable of when survival is the only option.

He lost an arm. He gained the rest of his life.

Date: April 26 – May 1, 2003 | Location: Bluejohn Canyon, Utah | Subject: Aron Ralston (age 27)