Crash Survivor: Tight Dress Saved Me

UK woman says doctors told her it helped prevent serious injury
By Newser Editors,  Newser Staff
Posted Dec 31, 2014 4:00 PM CST
Crash Survivor: Tight Dress Saved Me
   (Shutterstock)

A bizarre story making the rounds in the British press involves a 21-year-old woman who says her tight red dress proved to be a life-saver during a vicious car accident. As the Telegraph reports, Zoe Turner was in a taxi with friends when a cement truck slammed into it. Everybody survived, but Turner ended up with a fractured pelvis, fractured vertebra, and a broken sternum—though it apparently could have been much worse:

  • "The doctors told me that if I hadn't worn such a tight dress which held in place my bones as the car impacted, I would have most definitely punctured vital organs as my bones went out of place."

The story is going gangbusters in the British media, complete with photos of Turner decked out in her Christmas dress before the party and, later, in her hospital bed. See the Daily Mail, the Mirror, the Sun, ITV News, etc. Multiple stories use the same explanation of how the "bodycon" dress "acted like an old-fashioned corset" and kept things in their proper place at crunch time. Alas, none actually talk to any of Turner's doctors directly. But even so, "go ahead and order that leopard-print bandage dress that'll fit you like a vacuum-sealed packet of astronaut food," suggests Kelly Faircloth at Jezebel. "It could save your life!" (In Utah, a mom and two kids survived a crazy wreck with a fuel tanker.)

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