Jimmy ‘MrBeast’ Donaldson is one of the world’s most popular YouTubers — but he and his crew almost suffered a horrible fate after driving back home from filming a lengthy video.
There’s almost no one who frequents YouTube who hasn’t heard of MrBeast. The North Carolina-based content creator has become one of the platform’s biggest stars, boasting over 68 million subscribers on his main channel, alone.
Known for orchestrating insane challenges, filming large-scale videos, and giving away hundreds of thousands of dollars to his friends and local communities, MrBeast holds nothing back when it comes to his content.
However, Donaldson and his friend group have done enough crazy stunts to warrant some concern on the part of his viewers — like that time he buried himself alive for 50 hours — but nothing comes close to the story he regaled to fellow YouTuber Logan Paul.
MrBeast is known for orchestrating huge challenges for his friends, his most recent being a $500,000 game of tag in a giant stadium.
During a September 7 episode of the imPaulsive podcast, MrBeast described the horrifying moment when he and his friends “almost died” while traveling back home from filming an 8-hour video the day before.
Donaldson made sure to clarify that he and his friends had not been drinking the night prior and had all gotten a full night’s sleep. Unfortunately, the driver of the car they were taking on the way back home fell ill — and immediately fell asleep at the wheel after notifying MrBeast of his condition.
“I’m looking at the road, and I turn around and look to my left, and his head’s just bobbling,” he described, mimicking his friend’s comatose state. “His arms just went limp.”
MrBeast has undertaken a slew of dangerous challenges for his videos, including being buried underground in a coffin for 50 hours.
After taking hold of the wheel, Donaldson yelled at his friend to “wake the f**k up,” before his other friend in the backseat “literally punched him in the head” — to no avail.
“So we’re screaming, ‘Wake up!’ as we’re going down the highway, and his foot is still on the gas, so we’re slowly going faster,” he continued. “We’re going 80, 85. …and I’m just like, ‘Tyler, I don’t think this f**ker is gonna wake up.’”
Luckily, MrBeast managed to avoid running into anyone while he took his friend’s foot off the gas (all while simultaneously steering the car based on the sound of the wheel hitting the paint strip on the road), tapping the brakes with his hand to get the vehicle to slow down.
On top of his success as a YouTuber, MrBeast has opened his own restaurant and even started his very own charity.
Once the crew had stopped on the side of the road, his friend regained consciousness and promptly slammed on the accelerator. Donaldson then turned the wheel away from the road and toward a concrete wall, which stopped them from going any further — although MrBeast did end up suffering a head injury.
It turns out that MrBeast’s comatose friend had suffered sudden cardiac arrest in the middle of their trip back home due to a highly rare condition.
“By all metrics, he was literally dead, and there was a dead man driving the car,” Donaldson explained.
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Luckily, the entire crew emerged (mostly) unscathed, and their friend at the wheel is alive and well — but the horrifying ordeal certainly made for an interesting story!