In December of 1980, Jean Hilliard, a 19-year-old, was on her way back to her residence in Lengby, Minnesota following an outing with friends. While en route, she lost control of her vehicle as it skidded on an icy patch and ended up in a roadside ditch.
Clad in western boots, a coat and mittens, she stepped out of her car in -30 Celsius to seek her friend's assistance who lived a few miles away. However, she tripped and lost consciousness.
It took six hours before anyone noticed that her body had become completely frozen. She was found frozen solid in her friend Wally Nelson's front yard. Mr Nelson instantly recognised her and rushed her to the hospital which was 10 minutes away.
"I grabbed her by the collar and skidded her into the porch," Nelson would report years later in a Minnesota Public Radio interview.
"I thought she was dead. Froze stiffer than a board, but I saw a few bubbles coming out of her nose."
Doctors at Fosston Hospital had no hope about Hilliard's condition. They encountered significant difficulty in attempting to insert an IV into her frozen arm, repeatedly breaking needles in the process.
Despite their belief that she was close to death, they still chose to initiate the process of warming her up using heating pads.
By midmorning, Ms Hilliard woke in spasms.
"I can't explain why she's alive,'' Dr George Sather, who helped treat the young woman, told the New York Times. "She was frozen stiff, literally. It's a miracle."
"The reaction didn't appear until two or three hours after she started thawing out,'' Dr. Sather said. "The body was cold, completely solid, just like a piece of meat out of a deep freeze."
Dr Edgar Sather recalled that her pulse, hardly registering through her frozen skin, was about 12 beats a minute. Her temperature was too low for a thermometer, with a low reading of 88 degrees, 10 degrees below normal. But in several hours, wrapped in an electric heating pad, she began to revive.
