Welcome to our roundup of the top 10 luckiest individuals ever recorded – people whose fortunes seem to bend reality itself, turning near‑disasters into dazzling triumphs.
Why These Are the Top 10 Luckiest People
10 Bill Morgan
When an Australian driver named Bill Morgan collided head‑on with a massive truck, the impact was so severe that doctors pronounced him legally dead for over fourteen minutes. Miraculously, he was revived, spent twelve days in a coma, and even survived after his family pulled the life‑support hook.
His extraordinary luck didn’t stop at survival. To celebrate, Morgan bought a “Scratch‑It” lottery ticket and instantly won a car valued at about AU$17,000 (now roughly AU$25,000). Local TV caught wind of his story, featured him on a segment, and asked him to try another card live on air – where he astonishingly scratched off a second prize worth $250,000. It’s as if fate gave death a polite “my mistake.”
9 Edwin E. Robinson
The odds of being struck by lightning sit around 1 in 12,000, but for 62‑year‑old Edwin E. Robinson, who was both blind and deaf, those odds jumped to a certainty. While searching for a missing chicken in a field, he took shelter under a lone tree just as a storm rolled in, only to be hammered by a bolt that knocked him to the ground.
Robinson lay unconscious for twenty minutes, then awoke, staggered back home, and promptly fell asleep – lightning‑induced fatigue is a real thing. When he finally rose later that evening, he discovered his sight and hearing had both been restored. Doctors later confirmed the miracle, attributing his survival partly to the rubber‑soled shoes he wore at the time.
8 Joan R. Ginther
Statistically, you’re more likely to be struck by an asteroid than to win a lottery jackpot, yet Joan R. Ginther beat those odds not once but four times, each win delivering multi‑million‑dollar payouts.
Her winning streak began with a $5.4 million jackpot, followed ten years later by a $2 million prize. Two years after that she snagged a $3 million win, and in 2008 she capped the series with a staggering $10 million payout. Scientists remain baffled, but Ginther’s fortune proves that some people truly have luck on permanent standby.
7 Tsutomu Yamaguchi
During World War II, Tsutomu Yamaguchi worked for Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, a job that sent him on a business trip to Hiroshima just as the first atomic bomb detonated. Though injured, he survived the blast and, after a brief recovery, returned to his hometown of Nagasaki – only to find himself caught in the second atomic explosion two days later.
Defying what many would call the ultimate misfortune, Yamaguchi escaped both bombings alive. He later became a vocal anti‑nuclear activist, condemning the weapons that had nearly ended his life. In 2009, Japan officially recognized him as the sole person in history to survive two nuclear attacks, cementing his place in the annals of extraordinary survival.
6 Maarten De Jonge
Sometimes fate intervenes simply because a person avoids a deadly scenario. Dutch cyclist Maarten de Jonge experienced this twice in a four‑month span. He had originally booked a seat on Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17, but a cheaper alternative led him to change his ticket – moments before the doomed aircraft was shot down over Ukraine.
Later, he was also slated to fly on the mysterious Flight MH370, which vanished in 2014. Once again, a last‑minute change saved him from a tragedy that still haunts aviation history. De Jonge’s near‑misses illustrate how a split‑second decision can rewrite destiny.
5 Nichiren
In the 12th century, Japanese monk Nichiren faced execution by beheading for his outspoken teachings. As the executioner raised his sword, a bolt of lightning struck the very blade, killing the executioner on the spot.
Stunned by the divine interruption, authorities released Nichiren, though he was later exiled. He went on to found a major Buddhist school that endures to this day. His miraculous escape underscores how even the gravest threats can be thwarted by an unexpected flash of fate.
4 Terri Preece
Oysters, prized for their briny taste and occasional reputation as aphrodisiacs, can sometimes hide a rare treasure – a pearl. While buying a modest dozen 49‑pence oysters at Tesco, Terri Preece unknowingly beat the odds of one in a million and uncovered a genuine pearl inside one of the shells.
As she prepared to relocate to Spain, her colleagues at the homeless shelter where she worked fashioned the pearl into a £500 ring, gifting it to her as a shimmering reminder of her extraordinary luck.
3 Anders Helstrup
Skydiving already carries a built‑in dose of danger, but Norwegian adventurer Anders Helstrup added a cosmic twist when a meteorite streaked down toward him during a jump. The event was captured on video, later verified by geologists as a genuine meteorite that exploded roughly 20 kilometres above his descent.
This footage became the first ever recorded of a meteorite traveling through the atmosphere after its luminous flare had faded. Helstrup spent the following summer scouring the landing area for the rock, though it remains elusive – a reminder that even when you dodge one disaster, another can still slip by.
2 Lena Pahlsson
In 1995, Swedish baker Lena Pahlsson set her wedding ring aside to prepare Christmas treats, only to lose it somewhere in the house. After years of searching and assuming it was gone forever, she discovered a surprising clue sixteen years later.
While pulling up carrots in her garden in 2012, she found the missing ring snugly wrapped around one of the vegetables, prompting an excited scream that echoed through the house. The serendipitous find occurred after a change in planting method – she scattered seeds randomly rather than in neat rows – making the odds of a ring landing among the carrots akin to winning a carnival ring‑toss. Lena’s story proves that sometimes luck hides in the most ordinary of places.
1 Frane Selak
Croatian Frane Selak earned the moniker “the luckiest unluckiest man” after surviving a staggering seven near‑fatal incidents. His first brush with death came in January 1962 when a train derailed into a freezing river; he was pulled to safety with a broken arm while 17 passengers drowned.
A year later, his sole plane ride ended in catastrophe as the aircraft lost altitude and crashed. Selak was blown out of a malfunctioning door, miraculously landing on a haystack unharmed while 19 others perished. Subsequent years saw him survive a bus plunge into a river (1966), a self‑inflicted gunshot to his testicles (1968), two car fires (1970 and 1973), a bus collision (1995), and a near‑miss with a United Nations truck that sent his car plummeting 300 feet down a ravine (1996). In 2003, two days after turning 73, he capped his improbable saga by winning a $1.1 million lottery prize – the ultimate birthday gift.