PENROSE, COLO. (AP) A 19-year-old man from Penrose is back at work as a volunteer firefighter and training to be an emergency medical technician, a little more than two months after an accident that could have killed him.

Chris Clear was moving a roto-tiller April 22 when something snapped, and he felt what seemed like a rock hitting him in the face. Later, pain moved to the back of his neck, and Clear began to experience other, more serious symptoms.

A second trip to a hospital, and an x-ray, revealed that a pin from the roto-tiller had come loose, entered his nose and passed through his brain.

Clear was given a grim prognosis, but nine hours of surgery to remove the pin proved successful.

Today, clear has lost some of his peripheral vision, and, he no longer eats sweets.