(CNN) — The leather jacket Zachary DeMoss was wearing during his motorcycle accident in Idaho may have saved his life.

It wasn’t so much the jacket that protected him during the accident, but rather it was useful in the days that followed, when the 24-year-old got lost in the wilderness and fought to survive.

Because of his injuries, he was too weak to fetch water himself and was barely able to move, so he dipped the jacket in a nearby stream and then drank water from the jacket pocket, he told CNN.

DeMoss, 24, from Missoula, Montana, was trapped in the wilderness of the Idaho mountains for five days after the accident before being rescued by a family friend.

“I’m so lucky and grateful to be alive. I had to deal with so much pain and death in the forest,” he told CNN. “But I kept telling myself that it was either a lot of pain or a little bit of death, and I wasn’t going to choose death.”

DeMoss and his black 2000 Kawasaki Vulcan motorcycle disappeared on August 12 on Highway 12 in Idaho, the Idaho County Sheriff’s Office said. He was riding with two other bikers and did not return to their meeting point.

Authorities, along with DeMoss’ family and friends, searched a 99-mile stretch nearby, but then announced on August 15 that they would “narrow down” their search in the next few days.

One state over, in Oregon, 45-year-old Greg Common, a friend of DeMoss’s family, decided to take matters into his own hands after hearing that authorities were scaling back search efforts.

“I called my wife from work and said, ‘We’re going.’ And my wife started loading up all my stuff and getting everything ready while I drove home from work. Then we drove up the mountain,” Common said.

DeMoss and Common’s eldest son became close friends after meeting in high school when the Commons lived in Montana.

Common thought he might be able to find DeMoss because he also rode a motorcycle and knew the area – and he was right.

But at first he didn’t even recognize his family friend.

“I was looking. You know, I had done 30 miles the day before. I had already done five miles that morning, and then I was about a mile up, so the sixth mile of the day,” Common said. “I look over and see this guy lying next to the creek. I didn’t even recognize him… so I yell at him. And he turns to me and says, ‘Man, I had an accident. I’m sick.’ And then I realize I’m talking to Zach!”

DeMoss told CNN he swerved to avoid hitting a deer and then essentially flew his motorcycle 40 feet across a creek into a remote, grassy area, separated from his motorcycle.

“It happened really fast, but I remember floating through the air before I hit the ground,” he recalls.

“For the first two days, I managed to get water before I collapsed and could barely move despite my efforts to crawl back to the creek,” DeMoss said.

DeMoss had a campfire torch on his motorcycle, which Common said would have helped someone find him if they had been closer to his motorcycle.

“You don’t think you’ll find her alive”

For Common, DeMoss’ survival is a testament to his friend’s determination and willpower.

“The willpower it must have taken to survive five days like that. I can’t even imagine it,” said Common. “The boy survived five days on that mountain.”

He said DeMoss recognized the older man immediately when he heard his voice.

“He’s like, ‘Oh man, thank God,'” Common said. “And then he literally tries to hug me. He’s like, ‘I love you, man.’ And he can only move one arm and his head. The rest of him is pretty messed up.”

He described how devastated he felt after DeMoss was discovered. “When someone goes missing after five days, in a country like this, you don’t think they’re going to be found alive.”

Common said he spotted DeMoss in a dark hole in a fairly overgrown, wooded and remote area. He was found at the Lost Creek Campground near mile marker 136 on Highway 12, according to the sheriff’s office.

Common immediately put out an SOS call using his Garmin inReach device, while his wife flagged down a driver in a pickup truck who contacted a DOT representative down the road. The DOT representative contacted emergency services, who were already on their way in response to the SOS call.

According to Common, a Life Flight helicopter arrived on site about 30 minutes later.

“I didn’t want to leave him on the mountain,” he said.

DeMoss is still recovering from his injuries and was recently moved from the intensive care unit to a regular hospital room, he told CNN.

Ruth Rickenbacher, DeMoss’ mother, described his injuries in a Facebook post, including a partially collapsed lung, a broken hip and broken ribs.

“It’s like he’s been shaken like a rag doll,” she wrote.

His family also hopes to raise money for his “long and costly recovery” through a verified GoFundMe campaign.

The-CNN-Wire
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