Babies are cute. Useful? Maybe not. They suck boobs, fill diapers and clutter up formerly good Instagram accounts, and that's about it. However, the ten infants listed here have accomplished things that even grown men couldn't do. Get ready to meet the most badass babies in the world.
Pit Viper Killer
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If you were to lay odds on the chances of a one year old baby winning a fight with a pit viper, smart money's on the snake. But there's always room for a dark horse candidate to surprise you, and that's exactly what happened in Brazil earlier in 2015. A family in the southern town of Mostardas discovered their infant son in the back yard with a bloody snake and rushed both the kid and the dead animal to the hospital. Doctors examined both and discovered that the little one had managed to bite the snake right behind the head, forcing its jaws shut and preventing it from biting back in retaliation. Good thinking, little dude.
Car Crash Survivor
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Are babies tougher than adults? You might think you know the answer, but it can be surprising. In July of 2015, Richard Beaumont and his girlfriend Dawna Loughney were driving down I-80 just outside of Wells, Nevada when their Ford Explorer veered off the road and plowed into a guardrail. The impact was so intense that it rolled the car, and neither adult was wearing a seatbelt, so they were hurled from the truck and killed instantly. Riding in the back seat was their 1 year old daughter, who was not in a car seat. She was also ejected from the Explorer, but somehow managed to survive the crash that killed her parents without a scratch on her.
Bulletproof Baby
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The world is a scary place, and the responsibility of raising a child can be too much for some people. That's the reasoning behind Argentine couple Francisco Lotero and Miriam Coletti's 2010 global warming suicide pact. Overwhelmed with the thought that global warming was making the planet unlivable for future generations, Lotero and Coletti shot their two children before turning the guns on themselves. Amazingly enough, their seven month old baby survived - the bullet in her chest missed any vital organs, and she proceeded to hold on to life for three days until a neighbor discovered the grisly scene. With kids this tough, I'm not too worried about the future.
Explosion Survivor Baby
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When something explodes, our natural instinct is to run away from it in slow motion, like we've seen in Michael Bay movies. But what if you're too little to run? Ask 9-month-old Olandrea Shannell Elliot of Holly Springs, Mississippi, who was resting in her crib when a propane explosion completely destroyed her house in a massive fireball of devastation. Her uncle and grandparents were rescued from the blaze by firefighters, but they couldn't find the little girl. That is, until fifteen hours later, when a search crew lifted some debris in the basement to find her, slightly burned but alive and well despite living through a huge explosion and a house collapsing on top of her.
Frozen And Thawed
![Bad-ass babies, incredible infant survival stories]()
If you live in the glacial cold of northern Canada, maybe you should try to keep your door shut? In 2001, the family of Erika Nordby learned that the hard way, when she froze and came back to life. At just 13 months, Erika decided that the scene inside was too wimpy for her, so wandered out the front door into the −24 °C winter clad in only a diaper. After her absence was noticed, her parents frantically searched the snowbanks. When they found her body, Erika's heart had been stopped for two hours and she was considered clinically dead. Nobody told the little girl that, though - after being placed under a warming blanket, her heart started beating again all by itself and she made a full recovery.
Vodka Drinking Baby
![Bad-ass babies, incredible infant survival stories]()
Alcohol and babies don't mix, so the tale of a little girl in Wisconsin should be a chilling one. The unnamed six week old was getting ready for her feeding when her parents, distracted by the chaos of handling a new baby, accidentally mixed her baby formula with two shots of vodka instead of the traditional water. The little one didn't wince at the potent concoction and chugged it down, only to start acting a little crunk. The parents realized what they'd done and rushed her to the hospital, where she tested with a BAC of 0.294 - more than enough to get you a DUI. Thankfully, the girl recovered well and the parents won't make that mistake again.
Tornado Survivor
![Bad-ass babies, incredible infant survival stories]()
Paint a mental picture for yourself here: a massive tornado comes to town and completely levels your house down to the foundation. You're inside, and the windstorm picks you up and throws you 40 feet away. Oh, and you're a baby. Pretty much fatal, right? Not for 14-month-old Blake Opperman, who survived a tornado wrecking his family's Michigan home. Blake was asleep in his crib when the tornado did its work, and his parents heard him crying in the aftermath and pulled him, completely unharmed, from a pile of rubble.
Run Over By A Train
![Bad-ass babies, incredible infant survival stories]()
One of the biggest fears any city parent has is the terrifying - and hard to dispel - notion that your little one will somehow fall underneath a subway train and get squashed like an overripe melon. It rarely if ever happens, but like sharks or clowns we can't stop thinking about it. Here's a little story to ease your mind: in 2009, a baby in a carriage rolled off a train platform in Melbourne, right into the path of an oncoming train. The driver hit the brakes, but the baby still got smacked by the engine and dragged down the track to the horrified screams of its mother. Here's the happy ending, though: the little one was such a toughie that it came out completely unscathed, without a single injury.
14 Hours In A Frozen River
![Bad-ass babies, incredible infant survival stories]()
Picture this: you're in a car. It's flipped upside down, and the top half is slowly sinking into a frozen Utah river. Oh, and you're wearing diapers. How long do you think you could hold out? The diapers probably helped, but it's fair to say that 18 month old Lily Groesbeck is more of a badass than you, because she endured 14 hours trapped in a car submerged in an icy river and came out just fine. After her mother drove off a bridge and landed in the river below - sadly killing her - Lily hung upside down in her car seat for more than half a day before rescuers spotted the vehicle and managed to extract her.
Buried Alive Baby
![Bad-ass babies, incredible infant survival stories]()
It's tough for a baby in China, thanks in part to that country's draconian population control laws. So when a newborn comes out and it's not perfect, parents sometimes go to awful extremes to get rid of it. Case in point: a child born in Guangxi province with a cleft palate. Unwilling to raise a child with a deformity, his parents took the newborn and buried him alive. That would be the end of the story for a less badass baby, but this dude wasn't going to give up. He survived for eight staggering days underground, instinctively sucking moisture from the soil, until an elderly woman heard his cries and dug him up. The tough little boy recovered well once placed in a hospital incubator.
More aww-tastic stories: 10 Unlikely Heroes that Surprised Us All
Pit Viper Killer
If you were to lay odds on the chances of a one year old baby winning a fight with a pit viper, smart money's on the snake. But there's always room for a dark horse candidate to surprise you, and that's exactly what happened in Brazil earlier in 2015. A family in the southern town of Mostardas discovered their infant son in the back yard with a bloody snake and rushed both the kid and the dead animal to the hospital. Doctors examined both and discovered that the little one had managed to bite the snake right behind the head, forcing its jaws shut and preventing it from biting back in retaliation. Good thinking, little dude.
Car Crash Survivor
Are babies tougher than adults? You might think you know the answer, but it can be surprising. In July of 2015, Richard Beaumont and his girlfriend Dawna Loughney were driving down I-80 just outside of Wells, Nevada when their Ford Explorer veered off the road and plowed into a guardrail. The impact was so intense that it rolled the car, and neither adult was wearing a seatbelt, so they were hurled from the truck and killed instantly. Riding in the back seat was their 1 year old daughter, who was not in a car seat. She was also ejected from the Explorer, but somehow managed to survive the crash that killed her parents without a scratch on her.
Bulletproof Baby
The world is a scary place, and the responsibility of raising a child can be too much for some people. That's the reasoning behind Argentine couple Francisco Lotero and Miriam Coletti's 2010 global warming suicide pact. Overwhelmed with the thought that global warming was making the planet unlivable for future generations, Lotero and Coletti shot their two children before turning the guns on themselves. Amazingly enough, their seven month old baby survived - the bullet in her chest missed any vital organs, and she proceeded to hold on to life for three days until a neighbor discovered the grisly scene. With kids this tough, I'm not too worried about the future.
Explosion Survivor Baby
When something explodes, our natural instinct is to run away from it in slow motion, like we've seen in Michael Bay movies. But what if you're too little to run? Ask 9-month-old Olandrea Shannell Elliot of Holly Springs, Mississippi, who was resting in her crib when a propane explosion completely destroyed her house in a massive fireball of devastation. Her uncle and grandparents were rescued from the blaze by firefighters, but they couldn't find the little girl. That is, until fifteen hours later, when a search crew lifted some debris in the basement to find her, slightly burned but alive and well despite living through a huge explosion and a house collapsing on top of her.
Frozen And Thawed
If you live in the glacial cold of northern Canada, maybe you should try to keep your door shut? In 2001, the family of Erika Nordby learned that the hard way, when she froze and came back to life. At just 13 months, Erika decided that the scene inside was too wimpy for her, so wandered out the front door into the −24 °C winter clad in only a diaper. After her absence was noticed, her parents frantically searched the snowbanks. When they found her body, Erika's heart had been stopped for two hours and she was considered clinically dead. Nobody told the little girl that, though - after being placed under a warming blanket, her heart started beating again all by itself and she made a full recovery.
Vodka Drinking Baby
Alcohol and babies don't mix, so the tale of a little girl in Wisconsin should be a chilling one. The unnamed six week old was getting ready for her feeding when her parents, distracted by the chaos of handling a new baby, accidentally mixed her baby formula with two shots of vodka instead of the traditional water. The little one didn't wince at the potent concoction and chugged it down, only to start acting a little crunk. The parents realized what they'd done and rushed her to the hospital, where she tested with a BAC of 0.294 - more than enough to get you a DUI. Thankfully, the girl recovered well and the parents won't make that mistake again.
Tornado Survivor
Paint a mental picture for yourself here: a massive tornado comes to town and completely levels your house down to the foundation. You're inside, and the windstorm picks you up and throws you 40 feet away. Oh, and you're a baby. Pretty much fatal, right? Not for 14-month-old Blake Opperman, who survived a tornado wrecking his family's Michigan home. Blake was asleep in his crib when the tornado did its work, and his parents heard him crying in the aftermath and pulled him, completely unharmed, from a pile of rubble.
Run Over By A Train
One of the biggest fears any city parent has is the terrifying - and hard to dispel - notion that your little one will somehow fall underneath a subway train and get squashed like an overripe melon. It rarely if ever happens, but like sharks or clowns we can't stop thinking about it. Here's a little story to ease your mind: in 2009, a baby in a carriage rolled off a train platform in Melbourne, right into the path of an oncoming train. The driver hit the brakes, but the baby still got smacked by the engine and dragged down the track to the horrified screams of its mother. Here's the happy ending, though: the little one was such a toughie that it came out completely unscathed, without a single injury.
14 Hours In A Frozen River
Picture this: you're in a car. It's flipped upside down, and the top half is slowly sinking into a frozen Utah river. Oh, and you're wearing diapers. How long do you think you could hold out? The diapers probably helped, but it's fair to say that 18 month old Lily Groesbeck is more of a badass than you, because she endured 14 hours trapped in a car submerged in an icy river and came out just fine. After her mother drove off a bridge and landed in the river below - sadly killing her - Lily hung upside down in her car seat for more than half a day before rescuers spotted the vehicle and managed to extract her.
Buried Alive Baby
It's tough for a baby in China, thanks in part to that country's draconian population control laws. So when a newborn comes out and it's not perfect, parents sometimes go to awful extremes to get rid of it. Case in point: a child born in Guangxi province with a cleft palate. Unwilling to raise a child with a deformity, his parents took the newborn and buried him alive. That would be the end of the story for a less badass baby, but this dude wasn't going to give up. He survived for eight staggering days underground, instinctively sucking moisture from the soil, until an elderly woman heard his cries and dug him up. The tough little boy recovered well once placed in a hospital incubator.
More aww-tastic stories: 10 Unlikely Heroes that Surprised Us All