A man was rescued by the California Highway Patrol Coastal Division two days after accidentally plunging 400 feet over a cliffside.
The agency shared video on Facebook of the California Highway Patrol Coastal Division rescuing the man, who only suffered moderate injuries.
Authorities began their search on Tuesday after the Coastal Division Air Operations Unit received a call requesting they search the coastline from Post Ranch in Big Sur to Monastery Beach in Carmel for a vehicle over the side, the agency said in a Facebook post on Wednesday.
It was reported that a local employee had left work on Sunday night but never arrived home, according to authorities. A team located a vehicle approximately 400 feet over the side of the cliff near the beach below. The man was standing next to the video “franticly waving a makeshift flag,” authorities said.
Video showed authorities lowering a rope down to the man and lifting him up to the highway above.
The man told authorities that he was driving home from work on Sunday when he swerved to avoid hitting a deer, “causing him to veer off the roadway and roll several hundred feet down the cliff’s edge,” authorities said.
He said that he was ejected through his car’s sunroof as the vehicle rolled down the hillside.
Although the man had been stranded for two days, authorities said he “appeared to be stable and suffered moderate injuries.”