Good luck follows bad when actor Hays breaks his neck

Just in case you ever break your neck and wish to avoid death, here's a potentially helpful story from Robert Hays, the "Airplane!" star who is a walking "miracle."

Eight years ago, Hays thought he'd restore his sanity after his parents died, so he took off for a beach condo on Christmas Eve.

But he picked the wrong day to go body surfing.

"I bumped the bottom and shattered the dens on my C2," he told me. (That's the second vertebrae down from the skull, the area which often kills people during hangings).

What Hays did next kept his life from changing radically.

He grabbed his head and carefully held it to alleviate pain.

"I put my hands underneath my chin bone, in between my index finger and middle finger," he said, "and put my hands on my jaw and pushed straight up.

"When I felt the stabbing pain in my neck start again, I'd push up with my hands until the pain was gone."

He had been surfing with a buddy, who (at one point, while lifting Hays off the ground) put one hand on Hays' forehead another hand on the back of his head.

The friend drove Hays for 45 minutes to an ER.

"Every single pebble we rolled over jiggled my head enough to hurt like hell," Hays recalled.

Hays was flown to another medical center where a specialist bolted a neck halo into his head. (And Hays, known as a card, let Christmas decorations dangle from his neck halo.)

Hays' doctor told him that normally in such circumstances, he'd operate, slice into his neck, drill into his skull, and screw broken fragments to bone.

But Hays' C2 was so shattered, there was nothing to do but wait for the tiny pieces to grow back together.

Fortunately, the doctor told him, Hays had efficiently done one thing right — he'd kept his neck at exactly the correct position until he got help.

"The good news was, I had essentially saved myself from probably being a quadriplegic or even dead by grabbing my head and holding it in place, because I held all those little pieces in place," Hays said.

Hays chalks up this experience to his sense of self-preservation.

"We all look back and think, 'Holy smokes, how am I still alive after all the dumb things we did?,'" he said.

"Every time I go and see my doctor," he says, 'You know you're a miracle. It's miraculous you're still alive, you know that don't you?'

"I say, 'Yes, yes, yes, you keep reminding me, I was having a great day until you reminded me. I was feeling like I could live forever, but now I feel like tomorrow is it."

Hays is in town, from Malibu, Calif., this week, because he is one of many celebrities adding star power to the 17th annual Canon USA celebrity red carpet, dinner and golf event at Bellagio. The only way you can spectate is to take part by donating $1,500 to go to the carpet and to golf with these so-far confirmed stars:

Actors Kevin Sorbo (a Las Vegan), Chris McDonald, Adrian Zmed, Danny Masterson, Paul Logan, Paula Trickey, Chris Rich, Joe and Rosemary Regalbuto; TV stars from "The Property Brothers" and "Cake Boss" Buddy Valastro; athletes Chris Spang, Roger Clemens, Tommy John, Willie Gault, Eddie Payton, Kurt Bevacqua and Nat Moore; entertainers David Copperfield, Criss Angel, Pia Zadora, Zowie Bowie, Rich Little, Doc Phineas, Dr. Gadget, Gabriel Burrafoto, Murray Sawchuck, Clint and Kelly Holmes, and the Texas Tenors; and Ed Bernstein and chef Dominic Tedesco.

On Thursday and Friday, the fundraiser raises awareness and cash for the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, co-founded by John Walsh and his wife, Reve.

Walsh is known for having hosted TV's "America's Most Wanted" (and now "The Hunt") after his son Adam was abducted and murdered in 1981, leading to the Adam Walsh Child Safety and Protection Act.

The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children has helped authorities recover more than 215,000 children, shut down child porn and trafficking rings, fielded 6.6 million reports of child sex exploitation and analyzed 153 million child porn images.

Hays said Walsh should be declared a national treasure by Congress.

"You think about what happened to him. It probably ranks at the top of the most horrific things that could happen to a person. For him to take that, and to turn that around into an organization that has accomplished what it's accomplished, is astonishing."

Hays has missed Walsh's annual Canon event here only once, the year he was recovering from a broken neck.

"I know it wasn't much of an excuse," Hays joked.

Doug Elfman can be reached at delfman@reviewjournal.com. He blogs at reviewjournal.com/elfman. On Twitter: @VegasAnonymous.