This story was originally published in November 2022.
The small car bounced wildly along the rutted gravel road. Chad Thompson of Milford lay in the back seat, bleeding profusely, as his two friends raced to get him help.
The Old Town High School students were deer hunting on the last day of firearms season on Nov. 28, 1992, when one of them accidentally fired his rifle while loading it. The bullet tore through the left upper thigh of the then-18-year-old Thompson, severing his femoral artery.
“You almost felt it before you heard it, because it happened so quick. I had blood shooting out of my leg, and steam,” said Thompson, who somehow stayed on his feet.
He described the ensuing scene as chaos, but his friends acted quickly.
“They knew enough to tie a tourniquet on my thigh, which saved my life,” Thompson said.
Looking back as the 30th anniversary of that day approaches, Thompson is amazed he survived the catastrophic wound. Quick thinking, a lucky encounter with would-be rescuers, vital medical intervention and his own will to live changed his life in ways he never could have imagined — including his ongoing friendship with the man who fired the rifle.
“Beyond the fact that it was a terrible accident, someone was looking over me that day,” Thompson said.
Thompson was in trouble. They were 30 miles from Old Town, well off the Stud Mill Road, and there were no cellphones.
While speeding down the dirt road, the car’s oil pan was gashed by a rock. Then the engine seized up just as they came upon a group of hunters gathered at a pickup truck.
John Fahey Jr., Bruce Nickerson and Jeff Fahey were returning to their hunting camp on the rainy morning when they heard panicked shouts from down the road.
They raced to the car and found Thompson hunched over in the back seat. John Fahey was shocked, and said the exit wound in the front of the leg — packed with clothing to stem the bleeding — was the size of a grapefruit.
“I didn’t think he was going to make it out,” Fahey said. “The amount of blood was just unbelievable.”
They put Thompson in the bed of John Fahey’s truck and told his friends to apply pressure to the wound and keep him warm during the desperate ride. Fahey drove as fast as he could while Nickerson made sure the teens kept Thompson awake.
“I’m laying on my back, but I felt like I hadn’t slept in a month. I was so tired,” Thompson said.
Once back on asphalt in Milford, Nickerson jumped out at a house to call 911 while Fahey sped into Old Town. There they were stopped by police, who had paramedics and an ambulance waiting to transport Thompson to Eastern Maine Medical Center in Bangor.
Despite being in critical condition after blood transfusions and undergoing several hours of surgery, Thompson amazingly survived.
“From the minute that gun went off, everything went his way,” Fahey said. “He was very fortunate.”
Thompson spent two months at EMMC. Nine days into his stay, he developed bleeding that forced doctors to present him with a terrible decision.
Leaning on the support of his parents, Sam and Kathy Thompson, and his family and friends, Thompson opted for amputation of his leg below the knee rather than complicated restorative measures that might fail in the long run.
“I said, I am not going to live life having an issue that is going to prevent me from doing the things that I want to do,” he said.
During his recovery, Thompson was released briefly a few times. That included Christmas Mass at St. Joseph’s Church in Old Town, where he received a standing ovation. One of the unexpected hurdles was withdrawal while being weaned off the morphine that had been used to ease his pain.
The former three-sport athlete, an avid hunter and angler, was forced to adjust to life with a prosthetic limb. Thompson took a year off before enrolling at Maine Maritime Academy in Castine, where before the accident he had been recruited to play soccer. He battled chronic pain and discomfort with his prosthesis and withdrew prior to his junior year.
He tried to remain active alongside his friends in the years that followed, but it came at a price.
“I may have had a smile on my face, but at the end of the day I was gritting my teeth,” Thompson said. “I didn’t want it to dictate what I could do and what I couldn’t do, so I would just suffer through it.”
He attended the University of Southern Maine, but withdrew because of a leg infection, and then the University of Maine. Eventually he started a hydroseeding business, then ran a car wash for eight years in Old Town.
Thompson was back hunting about 10 years after the accident, although hearing gunshots initially made him flinch.
“It was mind over matter. I got used to the pain and discomfort every day. In my mind, I thought that’s what life was going to be like,” he said.
Longtime hunter Chad Thompson of Brewer, photographed with his dogs Tucker and Ace, has overcome physical and emotional challenges from a hunting accident 30 years ago. Thompson has become an advocate for amputees while enjoying the great outdoors. Credit: Linda Coan O’Kresik / BDN
Thompson eventually visited a prosthetics company in Oklahoma, where he met renowned prosthetist Kevin Carroll. A few years later, Carroll referred Thompson to Dr. Jan Ertl, who discovered that Thompson’s pain was caused by the type of amputation he’d had.
Ertl modified Thompson’s amputation, and the results were astounding. Thompson was able to do things that had been excruciating in the past, including playing with his children in the backyard.
“One of the kids pitched me the Wiffle Ball and I hit it. I instinctively ran to first base and everybody just stopped and looked at me,” Thompson said. “I got emotional. Everybody got emotional.”
Thompson’s moment of joy inspired him to write a letter to Carroll expressing appreciation for helping him get his health and his life back. Three weeks later, he was offered a job at Hanger Clinic, the nation’s largest network of orthopedic and prosthetic clinics.
“Chad is the real deal, just an amazing human being,” Carroll said from his home in Ireland. “It’s really an honor to know him for such a long time, and he’s a guy that I would definitely call a friend.”
Thompson has worked with Hanger Clinic for 18 years and serves as its area business manager for offices in Bangor, Augusta and Rockport. The job provides him with daily reminders of his ordeal and how he overcame it.
His experience as an amputee helps him counsel patients who are transitioning to prosthetics.
“He’s such a positive soul and gives so much to the community of persons with limb loss and other physical challenges,” Carroll said. “He’s a big deal and a very modest individual.”
Thompson, who also is a firearms safety advocate, is active with programs that provide amputees with the chance to participate in recreational activities.
“My motivation is making sure that those who have the surgery know that they’re not alone, that there are other people who have gone through what they’ve gone through, so they can work toward being able to function with a prosthesis and live life at any pace that they want to live it.”
In the years after the accident, Thompson bowhunted for deer, then took up duck hunting. Now, he’s again pursuing deer with a rifle.
“I’ve always been extremely passionate about nature and the outdoors,” said Thompson, who in 2021 shot a six-point buck on his land at Rocky Pond in Otis.
Thompson’s life isn’t the only one that was changed on that rainy November day. He remains friends with the man who shot him, and at one point they even shared an apartment in Portland.
“He’s a victim, too,” Thompson said. “He didn’t mean to do it, and he has to live with it the rest of his life. I’ve never, ever, held a grudge against him.”
The frightening images and experiences are burned into Fahey’s memory.
“I couldn’t tell that story for five years without crying,” said Fahey, who hunted deer only a handful of times after the accident, then gave it up.
Someone who meets Thompson and doesn’t know his story likely wouldn’t be aware that he is an amputee. He still hunts, fish, skis, snowshoes and enjoys other activities.
He believes that everything worked out the way it was intended.
“It’s been quite a journey,” Thompson said. “The fact that I’m able to do those things wearing a prosthesis and having the capability of helping someone drag a deer out, or putting up my own treestand, I just love it.”
