Aron Ralston was pinned in a 3-foot wide slot canyon near the Maze District of Canyonlands National Park south of Moab, Utah. To escape, he cut through his own arm below the elbow Thursday morning, applying a tourniquet and administering first aid before rigging anchors and fixing a rope to rappel to the bottom of Blue John Canyon and hiking out to meet rescuers. Ralston had been hiking alone when the boulder fell and pinned his right arm as he was moving through the narrow slot last Saturday afternoon, according to information from the sheriff's offices in Emery and Wayne counties. Ralston told rescuers that on Thursday morning he realized he would not survive unless he took drastic action. He had run out of water on Tuesday. Search efforts that had begun Wednesday evening yielded no signs of the hiker until he walked out of the canyon with two other hikers at about 3 p.m. Thursday. Ralston was taken to Allen Memorial Hospital in Moab where he was stabilized before transport to St. Mary's Hospital in Grand Junction, Colo., for surgery. The episode marked Ralston's second brush with death since February, when he was buried in an avalanche while backcountry skiing in the Colorado Rockies. Ralston, an avid outdoorsman who has climbed 49 of Colorado's 14,000-foot-plus mountains, was buried up to his neck in the avalanche, managing to dig himself out along with a completely buried skiing companion within 15 minutes. Aron has appeared on the Today Show, Good Morning America, and the Late Show, the Ellen DeGeneres show, CNN, CNBC, and was the subject of a two-hour NBC Dateline special with Tom Brokaw. He was a GQ Man of the Year and a Vanity Fair Person of the Year in 2003. Fortis Benefits Insurance gave Aron their inaugural Shining Star of Perseverance award, and in 2005, he received the Gene Autry Courage Award. Aron Ralston has given dozens of speeches for church, youth, college, corporate, and trade groups, helping to fund-raise over $250,000 for non-profits in the past two years. Titles Between a Rock and a Hard Place Survival: The Personality of Leadership Talk titles can be customized to specific meeting needs Topics Risk, Safety, Motivation, Adventure Click topic above to see more speakers on that topic Speaker's Asking Fee Range $15,000 or more Click on fee range to see more speakers. This is the starting keynote fee range - other programs may be higher. State CO Click on state above to see more speakers from that state. Fees The fee range quoted means the speaker's fee starts somewhere within that range. Note that speaker's fees are subject to change and some speakers may have special fee quotes.